BPP tackles request for clemency of 'Abadilla 5'

MANILA, Philippines – The Board of Pardons and Parole (BPP) convenes today to tackle the request for executive clemency of the five men convicted for the 1996 killing of police colonel Rolando Abadilla, chief of the military intelligence service group under the Marcos regime, Justice Secretary Leila de Lima said yesterday.

De Lima had a meeting with the “Abadilla 5” inside the maximum security compound at the New Bilibid Prisons (NBP).

“I have to extend to them personally my commitment to study their request very seriously,” De Lima said.

De Lima said the Abadilla 5 were among the 78 convicts whose cases will be reviewed by the BPP. She said the initial list was “revised” after President Aquino ordered the removal of convicts with drug-related and rape cases.

“Those in the list (are) truly meritorious cases,” she said. De Lima decided to visit the Abadilla 5 after the President cancelled his planned visit to the national penitentiary supposedly because he was not feeling well.