Lacson: Government stage-managed seizure of spy d

Beleaguered Sen. Panfilo Lacson accused the Philippine National Police (PNP) yesterday of orchestrating the recent seizure of sophisticated bugging devices from former members of the controversial Presidential Anti-Organized Crime Task Force (PAOCTF).

In a statement, Lacson said executives of Armstrack Corp., local supplier of the German-made GS-900 and Digital Directional Finder (DDF), were coerced by the PNP hierarchy to cooperate with the investigators in exchange for the dropping of charges in connection with a P2.5-billion questionable arms deal.

Lacson claimed a private corporation has complained to Mendoza about the transaction with Armstrack that went awry.

"The private company is owned by a friend of the PNP chief," Lacson said.

He added that his sources told him the PNP hierarchy purged the records pertaining to the arms deal.

At the same time, Lacson shrugged off allegations by Central Luzon police director Senior Superintendent Reynaldo Berroya that the PNP was seeking a court order to decode the contents of the bugging devices to establish the names of personalities targeted by the PAOCTF spying operations.

The gadgets were reportedly seized during a police raid on Armstrack’s training facility in Clark.

"It is so easy for Berroya’s men to concoct a list of political personalities and encode it in the computer to make it appear that the PAOCTF was really spying on politicians," Lacson argued.

He claimed that the three policemen arrested during the raid were members of the PNP’s directorate for research and development (DRD), not former PAOCTF agents.

"Unfortunately, the media chose to play up Berroya’s line that they were members of the PAOCTF," Lacson said.

He also charged that the equipment were seized not from the PAOCTF but from the suppliers themselves and three DRD members.

The senator, who was formerly PNP chief and concurrent PAOCTF head, insisted that the task force did not buy the machines under his watch.

He added that Armstrack did not meet the conditions stipulated by the contract and failed to provide the accessories needed for the machines’ proper operations.

"That’s why the equipment was seized while in the custody of Armstrack. It was never in the custody of PAOCTF," Lacson pointed out.

He also clarified that contrary to the presentation by Armstrack that the equipment is effective within a five-kilometer radius, its maximum range of effectiveness was only 50 meters and in only one direction.

He added that the supplier failed to post the required 10 percent performance bond and did not provide the vehicle to transport the equipment within the prescribed 30-day period following arrival of the shipment from Germany.

Lacson also recalled that Army Col. Dioscoro Reyes, former PAOCTF technical service chief, testified during the impeachment trial of former President Joseph Estrada that the bugging devices failed to perform under local conditions.

Mendoza sacks PAOCTF man

PNP chief Director General Leandro Mendoza relieved Senior Superintendent Magtanggol Gatdula, head of the security agencies and guards division, in connection with wiretapping charges filed against Lacson and 20 other former operatives of the PAOCTF including Gatdula.

Mendoza also directed other former PAOCTF officials to report to his office to shed light on the case.

He said he was coordinating with Armed Forces chief Gen. Diomedio Villanueva in connection with the probe on Reyes.

Gatdula reportedly signed the purchase contract for the GS-900 and the DDF in behalf of PAOCTF.

The document was subsequently notarized by then PAOCTF legal officer Aurelio Trampe on Feb. 1 last year.

Apart from perjury and wiretapping, charges of graft and malversation of public funds may also be lodged against Lacson and his former aides.

Aside from Lacson, Reyes and Gatdula, other probable respondents are Chief Superintendent Francisco Zubia and Senior Superintendents Michael Ray Aquino and Cesar Mancao.

Chief Superintendent Nestorio Gualberto, head of the PNP’s Criminal Investigation and Detection Group, said material and documentary evidence now in their possession clearly indicated that Lacson, who headed the PAOCTF in concurrent capacity, and his men lied in a Senate inquiry and in various media interviews by saying that they did not procure sophisticated bugging devices. – Aurea Calica, Christina Mendez, Rey Arquiza, Jose Aravilla