Quezon mayor convicted for allowing log transfers

The Sandiganbayan convicted yesterday the mayor of General Nakar, Quezon for issuing permits to transport logs to logging companies from 2002 to 2004.

The anti-graft court’s first division found Mayor Leovegildo Ruzol guilty of 221 counts of usurpation of official functions as penalized under Article 177 of the Revised Penal Code and sentenced him to a jail term of six months for each count.

In a 49-page decision, the Sandiganbayan ruled that Ruzol “issued permits to transport forest products without being lawfully entitled to do so since such an authority belongs to the Department of Environment and Natural Resources.”

It junked Ruzol’s defense that the authority to issue log travel permits had been devolved from the DENR to local governments.

However, his co-accused, municipal administrator Guillermo Sabiduria, was acquitted after the Sandiganbayan found no conspiracy between the two officials, as he only signed the receipts issued to the logging firms on the mayor’s orders.

The decision penned by Associate Justice Alexander Guismundo centered on the issue of whether or not Ruzol had the authority to issue permits to transfer logs out of his town.

Ruzol argued that under the Local Government Code (LGC), the authority to issue log transfer permits had been devolved to local governments.

But the anti-graft court upheld the argument of the prosecution that the only power divested to local governments under the LGC was DENR’s authority to implement forestry programs, excluding the transport of forest products.

Prosecutor Diosdado Calonge, director of prosecution bureau VI of the Ombudsman, cited the Sandiganbayan’s speedy resolution of the case, saying the information was filed last March 31 and it was submitted for decision in October.

“The accused already admitted the facts during the pre-trial so our documentary evidence was enough to prove the charge,” he said.

Based on the decision, Ruzol must be imprisoned for a total of 1,326 months or 110 years and six months.

But the anti-graft court explained that he could avail himself of the three-fold rule on conviction under Article 70 of the Revised Penal Code, where the jail term could be reduced to 18 months.

Calonge said usurpation of official functions is considered as the “second lightest crime.”