MANILA, Philippines - Actor and former Quezon City congressman Dennis Roldan and two others were sentenced to life imprisonment yesterday for kidnapping a three-year-old Filipino-Chinese boy in Pasig City in 2005.
Judge Rolando Mislang of the Pasig City Regional Trial Court (RTC) Branch 167 also ordered Roldan (Mitchell Gumabao in real life), Rowena San Andres and Adrian Domingo to each pay the family of Kenshi Yu (now 12 years old) P300,000 in damages.
In a 26-page decision, Mislang acquitted Octavio Garces for lack of evidence while the charges against Noel San Andres and Romeo Orcajada were declared terminated because of their death during the pendency of the case.
The case against Roldan’s fellow mastermind, Suzette Wang, was archived as she remains at large.
Mislang ordered Roldan, San Andres and Domingo immediately brought to the New Bilibid Prison (NBP) in Muntinlupa City after receiving their jail sentence. He also cancelled the bail that Roldan posted.
He also ordered the Philippine National Police custodial center in Camp Crame to release Garces unless he is being detained for some other lawful cause.
New look
NBP superintendent Robert Rabo said Roldan has undergone the process of being fingerprinted, photographed and strip-searched to check for any markings, cuts or bruises.
“He has a new haircut and has been issued a new prison uniform,” he said.
Roldan will spend 60 days in a diagnostic center, where he will be briefed on prison regulations and evaluated if he is a high-risk inmate.
While in the diagnostic center, he will be confined in isolation cells reserved for newly admitted convicts, according to Rabo.
After the 60-day period, Roldan will be assigned a number and join inmates in the NBP’s maximum security compound, he said.
Roldan to appeal ruling
Roldan’s legal counsel, lawyer Orlando Salatandre Jr., said he will appeal the ruling. Roldan himself expressed confidence that the decision could still be overturned. “This is just a beginning,” he said.
He had vehemently denied the charges, saying he was mistaken for another suspect. However, Mislang gave credence to the testimony of Yu, who identified Roldan as the kidnappers’ “big boss” and Wang as his co-mastermind.
Yu claimed that Roldan, who was wearing a hat to conceal his face, and Wang were seated in front of the van, where he was brought after he was taken. He identified San Andres as the man who took care of him while in captivity.
His nanny, Sherlita Continas, meanwhile, said it was Domingo, who grabbed the boy and brought him to the van.
Yu, accompanied by his nanny, was on his way to school along Ortigas Center in Pasig City on Feb. 9, 2005, when Domingo and San Andres snatched him and brought him to a van driven by Albert Pagdanganan.
Roldan called up the victim’s mother, Jennie, and demanded a P250-million ransom.
Yu was rescued by members of the Police Anti-Crime Emergency Response (PACER) at the gang’s safehouse on Harvard street on Feb. 20, 2005.
In his defense, Roldan questioned the legality of his arrest by PACER agents, and the inconsistencies in the testimonies of Yu and Pagdanganan, who turned state witness.
San Andres claimed that she has no knowledge that the child she was taking care of was a kidnap victim, while Garces denied conspiring with the accused, adding that he even pleaded with them to release Yu.
Closure
Teresita Ang-See, founding chairman of the Movement for Restoration of Peace and Order (MRPO), said Yu’s family “can now find closure with the conviction of Roldan, but we also feel the family’s infinite pain and sadness that Roger Yu, the father of the victim, passed away without seeing the fruits of his… painstaking efforts to pursue the case.”
Roger died in a car accident in Baguio City in 2008.
The MRPO – whose members attended all the court hearings in the case – commended Mislang, the fifth judge to handle the case, for his courage. Three other judges inhibited themselves and some admitted in writing that they were reportedly approached by Roldan’s supporters and received threats as well, according to the MRPO. – With Perseus Echeminada, Cecille Suerte Felipe