Undue haste
| C.R.O.S.S.R.O.A.D.S |
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| Jonathan De la Cruz |
The truism haste makes waste has never been more evident than in the high profile case involving retired Maj. Gen. Carlos Garcia whose plea bargain agreement with the Office of the Ombudsman has become the subject of intense scrutiny and, yes, partisan debate. No less than Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile brought this up when he pressed former Ombudsman Simeon Marcelo why he had to submit less than complete information (shortage of evidence was how it was described in the reports) in support of the charge of plunder he and his colleagues filed against Garcia on April 5, 2005. In the Senate chief’s view such undue haste virtually tied the hands of the prosecutors Marcelo left behind after he left office for “health reasons” in 2005 and gave rise to this now problematic agreement awaiting final approval by the Sandiganbayan.
No less than Marcelo himself and the then Special Prosecutor Dennis Villa-Ignacio admitted during the ongoing congressional hearings that “...there were no documents coming from the AFP with respect to the investigation that led to the filing of the information for plunder against Garcia...” before the same was filed. Worse, the duo have now admitted that they erred when they advised P-Noy in an “open letter” that Garcia himself submitted a “demurrer to evidence” before the Sandiganbayan. They were misled and as a result also misled P-Noy and the public. It turns out that Garcia never submitted anything of that sort. And, here is the kicker, the one and only basis of the charge against Garcia was a letter by his wife Clarita supposedly executed before a US Immigration employee, a certain agent Van Dyke, wherein she indicated their sources of their income to explain the bundles of cash confiscated from her and her sons as they entered the US sometime during that period. At the time of filing of the plunder charge, then Ombudsman Marcelo was still awaiting the report of then Commission on Audit (CoA) auditor Heidi Mendoza who was precisely tasked, together with 10 other auditors, to assist the Ombudsman in the ongoing investigation into alleged anomalous transactions at the AFP..... MORE
Source: The Daily Tribune
URL: http://www.tribuneonline.org/commentary/20110214com4.html
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