Regional Trial Court judge Gabriel Ingles ruled that Rowene Bangiban, 23, jobless, a native of Daanbantayan and Henry Cañete, 33, single and a jeweler of Katipunan Street in barangay Labangon, were found guilty beyond reasonable doubt for possession of illegal drugs.
Ingles said Bangiban and Cañete failed to establish any ill motive on the part of the arresting officers against them.
Bangiban was arrested by the tanods of barangay San Antonio headed by policeman Eppie Malalay while on the act of receiving a pack of shabu from a suspected pusher on September 19, 2003.
Malalay's team was conducting surveillance against drug personalities along Don Pedro Cui Street at around 2 a.m. when they spotted a man, later identified as Bangiban, standing near an electric post.
Later, another man approached him and handed to him a small plastic pack. Believing that it was shabu, the team immediately closed in on Bangiban and arrested him.
Bangiban admitted before the court that he was standing near the electric post and was sending a text message to his mother through his cellular phone when a man approached him and showed him a plastic pack. It was then that the tanods arrived and arrested him.
The court, however, was convinced that Bangiban was arrested by the tanods after he received the plastic pack, which was later found to be shabu. This made the warrantless arrest against Bangiban legal.
Cañete, meanwhile, was arrested by the elements of the Mobile Patrol Group who responded to a trouble alarm at Katipunan Street. The policemen saw Cañete examining the pack of shabu on his hand.
When the policemen asked him what he was examining, Cañete quickly threw the plastic pack into the ground but the policemen picked it up, believing it was shabu.
The court ruled that there was no reason for the policemen to single out Cañete and arrest him from among the crowd who witnessed the trouble to which they have responded to. - Rene U. Borromeo