Press Statement

The denial by the Honorable Regional Trial Court Judge Thelma Bunyi-Medina of my motion for reconsideration of a previous denial of my motion for reinvestigation out of “prudence” and deference to the Court of Appeals ruling on my pending petition for certiorari assailing the finding of probable cause and the subsequent issuance of the warrant of arrest against me may not be prudent after all. Nevertheless, I respect that order.

As to State Prosecutor Peter Ong and Secretary of Justice De Lima, gloating as they did after learning of the said order from the RTC, it is becoming clear that they are only after “winning their case” against me, even at the expense of justice itself.

They may have simply forgotten that “they are the representatives not of an ordinary party to a controversy, but a sovereignty whose obligation to govern impartially is as compelling as its obligation to govern at all; and whose interests, therefore, in a criminal prosecution is not that it shall win every case but that justice be done.” (Dimatulac vs. Villon, 297 SCRA 679).

To set the record straight, I have never asked the DOJ to unilaterally conduct a reinvestigation. Rather, I have likewise maintained that the court has the final say if such move shall be granted. What I simply asked was for DOJ to join and not oppose us in asking the court to have the matter reinvestigated taking into consideration new and compelling evidence, the latest of which was Mancao’s own admission that he “only learned of the sordid affair ex post facto” thus, a tacit admission that he fabricated his earlier testimony that he overheard me order another subordinate officer to commit the murders which served as the sole basis for the finding of probable cause against me. Obviously, DOJ did not heed our request.

I maintain that I am a victim of persecution because of my strong advocacy against graft and corruption during the past administration. It is very unfortunate that the present Department of Justice and its prosecutors have become and continue to be tools for my persecution.

***