Last 'Alabang Boy' acquitted

MANILA, Philippines - A Quezon City court yesterday acquitted the last of the three “Alabang Boys” arrested in 2008 for alleged possession and sale of illegal drugs.

In a 22-page decision, Judge Elvira de Castro-Panganiban of the Regional Trial Court Branch 227 cleared Joseph Tecson, saying the prosecution “utterly failed to establish that the pieces of evidence presented in court are the very same pieces of evidence recovered from the accused.”

De Castro-Panganiban said that “with such serious lapses and infractions committed, there is no other recourse but for this court to order the acquittal of accused in both cases.”

Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency (PDEA) spokesman Derrick Arnold Carreon said they “respect the decision of the court.”

Tecson was facing charges for violation of Sections 11 and 5 of the Republic Act 9165, the Comprehensive Dangerous Drugs Act of 2002. He was arrested on Sept. 20, 2008 in a follow-up operation by PDEA agents in Cubao, Quezon City.

A few hours before his arrest, PDEA agents nabbed Richard Brodett and Jorge Joseph for alleged possession and sale of illegal drugs in Alabang, Muntinlupa City. The three were later tagged as the “Alabang Boys.”

Brodett and Joseph were acquitted in August last year by Muntinlupa RTC Judge Juanita Guerrero, who said while the drug bust was “valid,” the “link in the custody of the drug evidence... has been broken.”

The judge said the prosecutors failed to establish whether the drugs seized from Brodett and Joseph had been presented by then PDEA chief Dionisio Santiago to members of media before or after forensic chemist Rona Mae Aguillon examined them. Guerrero said the lapse could have been explained had the prosecutors called Santiago or then team leader Ferdinand Marcelino to testify.

Inadmissible information

During the trial of Tecson’s case, prosecution witnesses claimed that the accused was arrested after Joseph relayed to them information about a certain Jopet who was actively selling prohibited drugs.

Jopet, later identified as Tecson, was arrested after he met and allegedly sold more than two grams of cocaine to a PDEA agent who accompanied Joseph in a follow-up operation. PDEA agents also allegedly seized from him four tablets of the drug Diazepam.

In her decision, however, De Castro-Panganiban said that the “so-called information” from Joseph that led to Tecson’s arrest is inadmissible in court because it was obtained without the assistance of a lawyer.

De Castro-Panganiban also noted that the “prosecution failed to present a clear and detailed picture of the incident that transpired before, during and after the arrest of the accused.” She added that the testimony of PDEA agent Louie Valdez was inconsistent with the testimony of other witnesses.

“There are other discrepancies noted in the sketch drawn by Agent Valdez... Thus the court asks, was Agent Valdez really involved in the second operation?” the decision noted, referring to the operation in which Tecson was arrested.

In his earlier testimony, Tecson said that Valdez was not the same person who arrested him during the operation in Quezon City.

The decision also noted that the spot report presented as evidence was inaccurate because it did not include the pieces of evidence allegedly confiscated from Tecson.

“Obviously, the logical conclusion drawn is that no drug items may have been in fact confiscated from accused Tecson,” De Castro-Panganiban said. – With Reinir Padua