Erap wants to be released on recognizance

Lawyers for detained former President Joseph Estrada asked the Sandiganbayan special division yesterday to allow him to be released on recognizance either to his wife or the Cebu Archbishop Ricardo Cardinal Vidal.

Estrada lawyer and former senator Rene Saguisag argued the request should be permitted to the same extent that the four American servicemen accused of raping a Filipina in Subic were allowed a similar legal option.

Saguisag told the anti-graft court that should the request for release on recognizance be granted, the defense panel’s petition for the ousted leader to be temporarily transferred to his Polk street house in Greenhills, San Juan would be superseded.

Saguisag said Estrada should be allowed by the justices to be released on recognizance either to Vidal or to his wife Sen. Luisa Ejercito.

According to Saguisag, Justice Secretary Raul Gonzalez was reportedly quoted by another newspaper last Jan. 15 as saying that recognizance or bail are the two alternatives which could be used in dealing with the custodial arrangements of the accused servicemen.

He noted this shows that release on recognizance is an available option even for a defendant facing a capital offense.

"Is it too much that the principal accused be accorded some ‘most favored nation’ treatment himself, that he not be treated worse than an alien accused of rape, by suspects who might have defiled not only one woman’s honor but that of an entire nation?" asked Saguisag.

"This court is not powerless to grant release on recognizance. It may include a crime such as rape. If the government agrees to give recognizance (to the accused US servicemen) on the suggestion of the Justice Secretary, we are validated on our theory that recognizance could also be accorded to an accused who has been jailed for more than five years," he added.

Government lawyers led by Special Prosecutor Dennis Villa-Ignacio, however, asked the court to dismiss outright the defense panel’s motion saying it was "based on hearsay."

"Right now there is no evidence to support this motion aside from a newspaper article which all we know is just hearsay," Villa-Ignacio said.

Special division chairwoman Justice Teresita Leonardo de Castro told Saguisag that she initially did not see the legal parity between the case involving the accused US servicemen and Estrada’s.

"What the court is proposing is to look at the Visiting Forces Agreement provision and to see whether or not you can invoke this by analogy to former president Estrada’s detention. But from what I understand, the Secretary (Gonzalez) is saying that the government has no choice but to follow the VFA which transfers the custody of the US servicemen to US authorities," she said.