SOLICITOR General Jose Calida on Tuesday said detained Senator Leila de Lima fabricated the jurat—or clause in which a notary attested that she made the statements under oath—in her petition and the attached affidavit of merit filed before the Supreme Court.
The debate over the legitimacy of the senator’s documents came as an associate justice of the high tribunal chided De Lima for her “undue haste” in bringing her appeal directly to the Supreme Court without exhausting other legal avenues.
Before the continuation of oral arguments on De Lima’s petition questioning the legality of her arrest in connection with drug charges filed against her, Calida said there was no record of a notary public going to Crame to visit De Lima.
If the documents are not properly notarized, he added, it will appear that no petition has been filed.
But De Lima maintained that the jurat was authentic and that the notary public met with her in Camp Crame, where she is detained.
In a press conference, Alex Padilla, legal counsel for De Lima said that the Office of the Solicitor General’s statement on the alleged defect in the notarization of her petition to the SC was a false allegation.
De Lima said that by focusing on “the bases of technicalities and in lieu of substantial arguments,” the OSG was “scraping the bottom of the barrel” to keep her detained.
But Calida said there were no entries in the log book to show that De Lima was telling the truth.
“Even Vice President Leni Robredo signed the logbook when she visited Senator De Lima,” Calida said.
On Tuesday, Supreme Court Associate Justice Noel Tijam agreed with the position taken by some fellow magistrates that De Lima may have violated the hierarchy of courts when she assailed the validity of her arrest directly before the high court following her indictment for drug trafficking charges.
Tijam made the observation during the continuation of the oral arguments on the petition filed by De Lima seeking to nullify the warrant of arrest and her trial for drug trafficking charges filed by the Justice Department before the Muntinlupa City Regional Trial Court.
Tijam, who was recently appointed by President Rodrigo Duterte as the 15th associate justice of high tribunal, said the presumption of innocence is still in De Lima’s favor because the lower court has not yet proven her guilty beyond reasonable doubt.
“But I have some grave concern about the undue haste by which you came to this court compelling us to make a pronouncement on the issue of jurisdiction,” Tijam said.
Tijam echoed earlier observation expressed by Associate Justices Presbitero Velasco Jr. and Diosdado Peralta, who both emphasized the importance of exhausting all available administrative remedies before raising the case before the Supreme Court.
“To me, the procedure should have been—you go first to the RTC and if you do not get a favorable decision, then go here to the Court,” Peralta said.
De Lima’s lawyers led by former Solicitor General Florin Hilbay earlier argued that the Department of Justice and the Office of Solicitor General could not agree on the nature of her offense; the Muntinlupa City court handling the case lacked jurisdiction; and the drug trafficking charges against De Lima lack basis.
“In the case of the petitioner, you have a situation where the prosecutors don’t have the authority to prosecute notwithstanding their clear duty to refer the case to the Office of the Ombudsman,” Hilbay told justices during the March 14 oral arguments.
However, Tijam reminded Hilbay that as an officer of the court, his “primordial duty” is not to serve the interest of his client.
“Therefore it is incumbent upon you to advice your client to abide by the petition process, you should abide by pronounced doctrines and rules like forum shopping and hierarchy of courts,” Tijam said.
During the resumption of the oral argument, Peralta again tackled the issue of whether or not De Lima’s petition was premature as she raised before the Court practically the same issues she pending before the Muntinlupa regional trial court handling her drug cases.
He said De Lima should have exhausted all available remedies in the RTC before going to the Supreme Court.
The magistrate said the pendency of her motion to quash charges before Muntinlupa RTC branch 204 could be a “problem” for her bid to secure relief from the high court.
“It is pending before you came here. Why not wait for the RTC? … In all cases that came here on lack of probable cause, the RTC first answered the queries of the accused,” Peralta said.
Peralta added that in all similar cases that went to the Supreme Court, there was always a finding of probable cause by the lower court.
Associate Justice Samuel Martires, another Duterte appointee, asked Hilbay if the rights of a senator are superior to the rights of an ordinary citizen.
Hilbay replied that anyone can avail of the remedy of going up to the Supreme Court if the prosecutors handling the case like the DOJ did not have jurisdiction.
“We’re asking for relief from this Court precisely because of the actions by the government with respect to petitioner [De Lima],” Hilbay said.
The issue of whether De Lima submitted to the Supreme Court a fabricated certificate stating that she personally signed the petition before a notary public was also raised during the hearing.
This came after De Lima’s lawyer denied allegation by Calida that she violated the rule requiring her to personally sign the petition in front of a notary public.
Velasco said the allegation is “very serious” as he ordered the petitioner to submit the affidavit of lawyer Maria Cecille Tresvelles-Cabalo, who supposedly administered De Lima’s signing of the petition on Feb. 24 inside Camp Crame in Quezon City.
“I’m bothered by this [allegation] because this could be serious breach of Rule 65 [of the Rules of Court],” Velasco said.
In response, De Lima’s counsels led by former solicitor general Florin Hilbay said the allegation was false.
Hilbay informed the Court that Cabalo met De Lima at the Criminal Investigation and Detection Group headquarters in Camp Crame on Feb. 24 where the senator signed the petition.
However, Velasco cited records from the Philippine National Police submitted by the OSG showing that no person named Cabalo visited De Lima on that day.
In her statement read by Hilbay during the hearing, De Lima claimed that the allegation is “borne out of desperation” as the OSG “resorted to the basest of technicalities, and in lieu of substantial arguments against the merits of her Supreme Court petition.”
But Calida stood by his allegation and even submitted to the court affidavits of PNP officers saying it was impossible for Cabalo to have met with De Lima inside Camp Crime on Feb. 24.
“She must be imagining things. It must be the spirit of the lawyer since I have the affidavits that the notary public did not go to Camp Crame,” he said.
The Solicitor General said the failure of the senator to personally sign the petition before a lawyer should invalidate her action before the SC.
Calida also pointed out that Cabalo is a sorority sister of De Lima at San Beda College of Law’s Lambda Rho Sigma, which was co-founded by De Lima.
Senior Associate Justice Antonio Carpio questioned Hilbay as to what makes De Lima’s case so special and important that she needed to go directly to the SC from the RTC.
Hilbay enumerated several reasons, including the special concern of petitioner on statements by ranking government officials, which gave the case a “political context.”
But Carpio said he wanted to hear some more compelling reasons on why De Lima should be exempted to the general rule on hierarchy of the courts, telling Hilbay to write them in their memorandum.
The two-hour hearing concluded at 4 p.m. and will continue next Tuesday, March 28, for the OSG’s presentation of arguments in defense of the Department of Justice and Judge Juanita Guerrero, who issued the arrest warrant against De Lima.
De Lima has been accused of allowing the proliferation of the illegal drug trade inside the New Bilibid Prison during her stint as Justice secretary in exchange for millions of pesos supposedly funneled to her senatorial campaign. She has repeatedly denied this allegation.
Also on Tuesday, Justice Secretary Vitaliano Aguirre II denied Hilbay’s claim that there was a conflict between the position of his office and the OSG on the drug cases.
“If there’s conflict in the information filed by the panel of prosecutors and the OSG’s interpretation, there should already have been an amendment. But we did not amend the information since there is no conflict,” Aguirre said. With Macon Ramos-Araneta, PNA