Court orders CIDG-7 to explain failure to present drug suspect

The Regional Trial Court has ordered the Criminal Investigation and Detection Group-Central Visayas to explain why it should not be held in contempt for failing to present in court a suspected drug pusher who was petitioned for a writ of habeas corpus.

RTC-branch 19 Judge Ramon Codilla ordered CIDG-7 chief Jose Jorge Corpus and his men to bring to court drug pushing suspect, Rasul Pabella, supposedly to appear in court for the hearing of the petition filed through defense counsels Gloria Dalawampu and Ruphil Bañoc.

Despite the court order, however, CIDG-7 failed to have Pabella appear in court, prompting the judge to order Corpus and his men to explain within 48 hours why they should not be cited in contempt for such alleged “open defiance” of a court order.

The judge also ordered Corpus to release Pabella immediately from alleged illegal detention.

Lawyer Bañoc accused CIDG-7 for illegally detaining Pabella and, despite the court order, it went to the Lapu-Lapu City Prosecutor’s Office to file the drug charges against Pabella.

Bañoc claimed the case was even antedated in a possible attempt to skirt the rules on “reglamentary period,” adding that it was filed already beyond the 36-hour period.

The lawyer further accused CIDG-7 for allegedly maltreating Pabella and, for such, filed yesterday in a Lapu-Lapu City court a motion to put Pabella under medical examination. 

CIDG-7 policemen said they perceived this as a tactical move of the counsel of Rasul Pabella, adding that the judge may have been ill-informed on the complaint because it was filed at the Lapu-Lapu City prosecutor’s office.

CIDG-7 legal counsel, Enrique dela Cerna, confirmed to The Freeman about the court order, saying that they are now preparing to move for a reconsideration of such order. The CIDG-7 would submit also the ordered explanation within the period, he said.

A CIDG-7 team, led by Chief Insp. Fermin Armendares III, arrested Pabella in a buy-bust operation at sitio Calubihan in barangay Pajo, Lapu-Lapu City last August 1.

That same day the CIDG-7 filed the case and Pabella was committed to the Lapu-Lapu City Jail the following day, or only a few hours before Judge Codilla issued the order to present the accused in court.

The police said the order was already “moot and academic” because, at the time the order was issued, it was already impossible for them to comply because Pabella was already in jail and no longer in their custody.  — Fred P. Languido and Edwin Ian Melecio/RAE