The Sandiganbayan denied on Friday the appeal of convicted plunderer Janet Lim-Napoles to remain at her detention center at the Quezon City Jail Extention in Camp Bagong Diwa, Taguig City.
Instead, the anti-graft court upheld the order to transfer her to the Correctional Institution for Women in Mandaluyong City.
Associate Justice Efren dela Cruz, chairman of the antigraft court’s First Division, denied the urgent motion for reconsideration of the camp of Napoles in open court.
Dela Cruz ordered the transfer of Napoles to the CIW in a commitment order dated Dec. 28. However, Napoles’ lawyer Erwin Legaspi said the convicted mastermind of the multi-billion-peso pork barrel scam remains at Camp Bagong Diwa as of Jan. 3.
Legaspi claimed that the order “seemed irregular” because it was Associate Justice Edgardo Caldona who signed the document as the “chairman” even if he is not.
But Dela Cruz rebuked him, saying the internal rules of the Sandiganbayan allows Caldona to stand as the division chief in case the chairman and the senior member are on leave.
“Considering that both the chairman and senior member of the court at that time were on official leave, there is nothing wrong with the mittimus [commitment order],” Dela Cruz said.
Caldona remained silent during the proceedings.
The anti-graft court, meanwhile, gave the Ombudsman 10 days to file its comment on the motion for reconsideration of Napoles on the guilty verdict.
Napoles was sentenced to life imprisonment owing to her alleged misuse of the Priority Development Assistance Fund, or pork barrel, of former Senator Ramon Revilla Jr. amounting to P224.5 million from 2006 to 2010.
Late last year, the Sandiganbayan had acquitted Revilla after the prosecution failed to prove he amassed ill-gotten wealth by channeling his pork funds to the Napoles-led foundations.