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Sunday, September 19, 2004 issue
"Society
wins not only when the guilty are
convicted but when criminal trials are
fair"
Saying false premises may cost the life
of an innocent man, the lawyers of Francisco Juan "Paco" Larraņaga
have asked the Supreme Court to "revisit" the sensational case.
In what could be their last chance to save Larraņaga
from lethal injection, Sedfrey Ordoņez, William Chua and Sandra Marie
Coronel exhorted the high court to call the case for oral arguments.
"An injustice can never be corrected by
another injustice. The call for blood may be loud and popular, but justice
demands that only the guilty be punished," they said. The SC not only
affirmed last February 3 the verdict of conviction handed down by the late
RTC Judge Martin Ocampo, it also upgraded the penalties of six of the
"Chiong Seven" from two life terms to death.
Sentenced to die were Larraņaga, Josman Aznar,
Rowen Adlawan, James Anthony Uy, Ariel Balansag and Alberto Caņo.
James Anthony's brother, James Andrew, was spared
from the death row because of minority, and sentenced to life
imprisonment.
The men were found guilty for the death of
Marijoy Chiong on July 16, 1997 and the kidnapping and disappearance of
her sister Jacqueline.
In their 3-page reply to the comment of the
Office of the Solicitor General (OSG) calling for the execution of the
young convicts, Larraņaga's lawyers said their client was framed.
The Office of the Solicitor General interposed
its objection to the motion for reconsideration filed by the lawyers of
the "Chiong Seven". The OSG said the convicts' motion for
reconsideration was just but "a rehash of their old arguments."
Contrary to the claim of the solicitor general,
Larraņaga's counsels said they had raised several valid legal questions
in their motion for reconsideration. "These were even supported by
direct quotes from court records," they said.
They pointed to grievous errors committed by
police, the prosecutors and the trial judge, "errors that either
undermined or buried the truth."
"Unfortunately, the Office of the Solicitor General refused to meet
these issues and merely relied on the blanket but unjustified
assertion," the lawyers said.
Lawyer Ordoņez, Chua and Coronel said the
high tribunal must revisit its decision "because certain facts on
which the court based its resolution to impose the death penalty are not
accord with the records. "
"IRREGULAR BEHAVIOR"
They said they would have wanted the OSG to
engage them on these matters "with legally tenable explanations on
the irregular behavior displayed by the policemen, the prosecutors and the
judge in this case."
"We wanted answers to
many of our doubts. The OSG skirted the issues, gave no explanations, and
merely praised the correctness of the disputed decision," they
lamented.
By filling the motion for reconsideration, Larraņaga's lawyers requested
the SC justices to give the questioned decision "a second look, a
more
thorough review.
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October 25, 2006
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La presidenta de Filipinas se compromete a
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condemned to die ) A video news report.
"In his motion, Larraņaga raised
"compelling constitutional
issues regarding the most basicelements" of his rights to
substantive and procedural due process.
The lawyers said they had painstakingly raised 11 points that should be
looked into by the high court.
On top of their questions was the conduct of the late Judge Martin
Ocampo, who, they claimed, "bullied the defense" by disallowing
their scheduled witnesses and pronouncing the defense to have waived the
presentation of further evidence.
"No less than Larraņaga raised and waived his hands in one of the
hearings to express his desire to testify," they said, "but the
court did not relent and refused to hear his testimony."
'USELESS' TESTIMONY
The lawyers brought to the court's attention the
transcript of stenographic notes of the Feb. 1, 1999 hearing showing that
the trial judge maintained his refusal to allow Larraņaga to take the
witness stand, branding his testimony as "useless."
"It was proper for the movant to question the validity of the court's
reliance on the findings of a trial judge who was not interested in what the
accused had to say or to observe his demeanor on the stand," they said.
The
lawyers said Ocampo had "made up his mind on what weight he would give
Larraņaga's testimony even before he heard it and despite the fact that he
did not hear it."
They
insisted that it was physically impossible for Larraņaga to be in
Cebu
at the time of the commission of the crime.
During the trial of the case, defense lawyers insisted that on the evening
of July 16, 1997, Larraņaga was with his friends at R & R Restaurant,
and stayed there until the early morning of July 17.
"Are
we going to send six young men to the death chamber on the say-so of a drug
addict and a convicted criminal? Is the trial judge correct in placing
greater weight on Rusia's word over that of an entire class of law-abiding
students who vouched for Larraņaga's presence in their cooking school in
Quezon City?" they said.
Rusia's
confession came out almost 10 months after the alleged kidnapping. He then
tailored his confession to conform to the physical evidence, Larraņaga's
lawyers said.
They cited
the result of the examination of University of the
Philippines
Prof. Jerome Bailen who conducted that the body found in Tanawan, Carcar
might not have been that of Marijoy's.
Bailen said
there was neither physical evidence to conclude that the woman was raped nor
proof that she had been thrown off a cliff while still alive, as claimed by
witness Rusia.
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