NATIONAL Police chief Director General Ronald dela Rosa on Monday admitted that self-confessed drug lord Kerwin Espinosa had outplayed law enforcement authorities when the drug trading charges against the latter were dismissed.
“We were really outsmarted, but you Kerwin might have outwitted us now,” he said in Tagalog, then added in English “but you cannot won (sic) us all the time, mark my word Mr. Kerwin Espinosa, you cannot won (sic) us all the time, some time we will be the one to won you…not you winning us.”
Dela Rosa said they exerted all means to strengthen the case against Espinosa, businessman Peter Lim and all other drug personalities.
Dela Rosa said Espinosa did not cooperate with the Criminal Investigation and Detection Group when he was asked to “reduce into writing” his confession during a Senate hearing, where he admitted to transacting illegal drugs with earnings reaching P40 million to P50 million annually.
They were only able to attach in their complaint newspaper clippings in relation to Espinosa’s confession which they thought sufficiently supported their case, Dela Rosa said.
Justice Secretary Vitaliano Aguirre II earlier said the CIDG submitted a weak complaint as they were not able to submit the transcript from the Senate inquiry where Espinosa admitted to being involved in illegal drug trade.
A 41-page resolution approved by Acting Prosecutor General Jorge Catalan and dated Dec. 20, 2017, said the “uncorroborated statements” of the complainant’s witness, Marcelo Adorco, could not be admissible evidence against the respondents.
The resolution described Adorco as an “evidently self-serving witness.”
Aguirre has formed a three-man panel of prosecutors to handle the motion for reconsideration filed by the Criminal Investigation and Detection Group.
In Department Order 152, Aguirre also ordered the National Bureau of Investigation to probe the state prosecutors who composed the panel that dismissed the charges.