THE Department of Justice was not able to meet its own deadline to resolve the criminal charges against 90 commanders and members of Moro Islamic Liberation Front, Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters and private armed groups tagged in the Mamasapano massacre of January 2015.
But Justice Secretary Emmanuel Caparas vowed to release the resolution of the case next week, without offering the reason for the delay.
Caparas had earlier said the resolution on the complex crime of direct assault with murder complaint that the National Bureau of Investigation filed against 90 MILFs, BIFFs and PAGs over the killing of 35 police commandos during the encounter would be released in February.
But this did not materialize as no resolution was released Friday although the preliminary investigation of the case by a panel led by Assistant State Prosecutor Alexander Suarez was concluded last Jan. 14 with only four of 90 respondents able to answer the charges.
Of the 90 respondents, only four submitted counter-affidavits and denied the charges: alleged MILF field commander Pendatun Utek Makakua, who denied the charges and claimed to be a farmer; Mustapha Tatak, a barangay chairman in Sapakan, Mamasapano; and civilians Lakiman Dawaling and Khalim Keda, who were accused of being field commanders of MILF involved in the killing of the 35 SAF men in Barangay Tukanalipao.
Facing the DoJ probe are 13 commanders of MILF and six commanders of BIFF, but the names of the respondents were not made public so as to prevent them from evading possible prosecution.
They were accused of acting “in conspiracy with one another to attack, employ force, seriously intimidate or resist the 35 SAF commandos, who were uniformed police officers and, thus persons in authority.”
The fact-finding team of prosecutors and National Bureau of Investigation agents based the report on accounts of eyewitnesses—including one identified only as “Marathon”—who identified the liable MILF and BIFF commanders and have been placed under witness protection program.
The viral videos of the encounter that circulated in social media sites also helped in the investigation and that their sources have been traced.
Based on the results of the probe, the killings of the SAF commandos appeared to be “spontaneous and not an institutional act of the MILF.”
The charges covered the cases of 35 slain SAF men who belonged to the 55th SAF company that engaged MILF and BIFF fighters and PAGs in the cornfields of Brgy. Tukanalipao.
Last October, the fact-finding team has released its second report involving the cases of the nine other slain commandos from the 84th SAF company in Brgy. Pidsandawan as well as the five civilians and 18 MILF fighters who were also killed during the clash.