Dismissal of Ampatuan’s contempt rap affirmed

MANILA, Philippines - The judge tasked to assist in the Maguindanao massacre trial has issued her first ruling in connection with the multiple murder case, dismissing the appeal filed by suspect Andal Ampatuan Jr. on the contempt charges that he lodged against several prosecutors and government officials.

In a three-page order released yesterday, Judge Genie Gapas-Agbada of the Regional Trial Court Branch 221denied the motion for reconsideration filed by Ampatuan regarding his contempt charge against former Justice Secretary Agnes Devanadera and eight others.

Ampatuan filed the complaint in 2009 after he was brought by agents of the National Bureau of Investigation  (NBI) to the Department of Justice for preliminary investigation without a court order.

Included in the complaint were former chief state prosecutor Jovencito Zuño Jr., assistant chief state prosecutor Richard Fadullon, senior state prosecutors Leo Dacera and Rosemarie Balauag, state prosecutors Rosendell Gingayon and Xerxes Garcia, lawyer Ricardo Diaz and NBI head agent Roel Bolivar. 

Ampatuan’s lawyer, Philip Sigfrid Fortun, asked the court to cite the nine for contempt, saying they violated his client’s  rights.

But in February 2010, Judge Jocelyn Solis-Reyes ruled that the justification of NBI agents in taking Ampatuan out of his detention cell was valid. She noted that the NBI move was made by virtue of a subpoena by the panel of prosecutors conducting the investigation.

Ampatuan maintained that his removal from detention without a court order was a contemptuous act.

In resolving the appeal, Gapas-Agbada said the motion was just a rehash of the initial arguments presented in the original motion.

In a separate order, the judge also denied the motion for reconsideration filed by Ampatuan on the May 28, 2010 omnibus order that resolved the suspect’s contempt charge against Devanadera, Zuño, Fadullon and former Commission on Human Rights chief and now Justice Secretary Leila de Lima.