YEARENDER: Maguindanao massacre trial trudges on (Second of two parts)

MANILA, Philippines - The motion was just one of the more than 300 filed in the course of the trial.

Earlier this year, several motions were filed after Andal Ampatuan Sr. vomited blood and was rushed to Taguig-Pateros Hospital even without a court order on March 9.

The defense sought his continued confinement after he was diagnosed with community-acquired pneumonia, a heart condition, diabetes, and other illnesses.

The Ampatuan clan patriarch, who was transferred to the AFP Medical Center, was discharged from the hospital and was back in jail on March 23.

Meanwhile, the prosecution panel – now headed by Taguig City Prosecutor Archimedes Manabat – was able to present this year additional witnesses and bring the total number of people called to the witness stand to 106.

Among those who testified in court were experts, police officers and victims’ relatives, including lawyer Gemma Oquendo, the sister and daughter of victims Cynthia Oquendo-Ayon and Catalino Oquendo, respectively.

Oquendo, who testified conditionally pending the CA decision on the defense petition against her presentation, identified the text messages sent by her sister to colleague Arnold Oclarit moments before she was killed.

Oquendo-Ayon supposedly sent a text message to Oclarit and asked him to contact a supposed lawyer of the Ampatuan clan.

“Advice client Ampatuan to stop it please. We might get killed,” the text message was quoted during the trial.

Recently, the prosecution panel also asked the court to exclude accused Bong Andal from the case for him to be used as a state witness.

Now under the witness protection program, Andal was the alleged backhoe operator who dug the graves of the massacre victims. He was arrested on Nov. 24 in Midsayap, North Cotabato in an entrapment operation conducted jointly by the local police and the Army’s 40th Infantry Battalion.

58th victim

On Sept. 24, the prosecution panel formally filed another set of murder charges against the accused for the death of Reynaldo “Bebot” Momay, the 58th massacre victim.

The remains of Momay – a photojournalist for the Midland Review, a local newspaper – were never found.

Led by a forensic expert, a team from the Commission on Human Rights recovered parts of the photojournalist’s supposed dentures.

In her complaint, Momay’s daughter Reynafe said her father had called a colleague before the incident and said that he was in the van together with other media people.

Despite the filing of the information, the trial proceedings on the 58th murder case have yet to push through.

Recently, the prosecution panel manifested that they would withdraw the charges due to discrepancies in the list of the accused indicted in the charge.

No live coverage of trial

On Oct. 23, the Supreme Court issued a resolution revising its earlier ruling that set the guidelines in the live TV and radio coverage of trial.

“This court is now disallowing the live media broadcast of the trial of the ‘Maguindanao Massacre’ cases but is still allowing the filming of the proceedings for (1) real-time transmissions to specified viewing areas, and (2) documentation,” the resolution said, a copy of which was sent to the lower court on Nov. 9.

The high tribunal partially granted the motion of Andal Sr., who said the June 14, 2011 resolution that allowed the live coverage of the trial “deprives him of his right to due process, equal protection, presumption of innocence, and to be shielded from degrading psychological punishment.”

Following the resolution, President Aquino, through the office of Solicitor General Francis Jardeleza, asked the high tribunal to reconsider its decision.

In a Nov. 22 motion, Jardeleza said “media coverage of trials of sensational cases – more so, those where the accused are reasonably perceived as politically well-entrenched, financially strong, and violently capable – should instead be encouraged.”

Media groups also filed an appeal, noting that “the right of an accused to fair trial is not incompatible to right to free press (and that) pervasive publicity is not per se prejudicial to the right of an accused to fair trial.”

The high court has yet to decide on the motions.