Sandiganbayan insists Erap’s US travel is legal

A spokesman for the Sandiganbayan special division trying the plunder case against ousted President Joseph Estrada debunked yesterday the claim of former Senate president Jovito Salonga that the naming of two more justices to comprise the division had violated the anti-graft court’s rules of procedure.

Lawyer Renato Bocar, special division spokesman, said Justices Diosdado Peralta and Norberto Geraldez Sr. were not "merely handpicked" as Salonga had alleged, and that they were designated based on the Revised Internal Rules of the Sandiganbayan.

"It just so happened that when the special division of five on the Erap motion was being constituted, Peralta and Geraldez had the lowest number of times of having been designated to a special division of five," he said.

"It was thus unavoidable that their names would be picked from the list of the other members of the Sandiganbayan."

Bocar said Presiding Justice Minito Chico-Nazario, who heads the special division, keeps a record of the number of times individual justices have been designated to a special division.

Bocar said the special division was forced to get Peralta and Geraldez after it failed to get the needed concurrence of the three justices comprising the division.

Of the three, Nazario and Justice Teresita Leonardo-de Castro had approved Estrada’s request to seek medical treatment in the United States, while Justice Edilberto Sandoval had dissented, he added.

Bocar said the justices discussed the motion of Estrada before they finally issued a favorable ruling on Dec. 23.

"It was only after such deliberation that the final ruling of the special division was prepared and circulated for the signatures of the justices in preparation for the promulgation the following day," he said.

The special division justices who approved Estrada’s travel request came under fire after prosecutors said it was a virtual grant of bail.— Delon Porcalla