EDITORIAL - Acquitted

The last of the so-called Alabang Boys was acquitted Thursday of drug charges. Quezon City Regional Trial Court Judge Elvira de Castro-Panganiban said prosecutors “utterly failed to establish” that the illegal drugs presented as evidence in court were the same items recovered from Joseph Tecson.

A statement from Tecson’s co-accused, Jorge Joseph, which pointed to Tecson’s supposed involvement in the drug deal, was obtained without the presence of a lawyer, the judge noted.

Joseph and the third accused, Richard Brodett, were acquitted in August last year of the same charges by Muntinlupa RTC Judge Juanita Guerrero, who noted in her ruling that the “link in the custody of the drug evidence… has been broken.”

Brodett and Joseph were arrested when they allegedly tried to sell 60 ecstasy pills in a sting operation in September 2008. Tecson was arrested in a follow-up operation after he allegedly sold over two grams of cocaine to an undercover agent of the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency who was with Joseph. The Muntinlupa court, citing testimony, noted that the confiscated ecstasy pills were presented to the media by then PDEA chief Dionisio Santiago while the drugs were supposedly still being tested by forensic experts.

Controversy hounded the case when prosecutors initially recommended the dismissal of the charges, for reasons similar to those given by the two trial court judges. PDEA agents and prosecutors then swapped charges of incompetence and possible bribery.

The case should teach law enforcers that if they want to make charges stand in court, they must learn by heart the legal requirements for conducting arrests and seizure and preservation of evidence. This knowledge is required particularly of anti-narcotics agents, who are likely to be confronted with accusations of planting evidence to carry out an arrest. Such legal requirements are there to protect people from trumped-up charges. Anti-narcotics agents have been accused of planting evidence to shake down the innocent.

The legal requirements, if not taken seriously by law enforcers, can also be used as loopholes by crooks to secure an acquittal. This means time, effort and government resources wasted. The case of the Alabang Boys should teach the PDEA and other law enforcement agencies about the importance of doing their homework.