Defense lawyer: More Degamo Suspects to recant

CEBU, Philippines — Expect more recantations from the gunmen implicated in the commando-style attack on Negros Oriental Governor Roel Degamo, their lawyer Danny Villanueva told “The Chiefs” on Thursday night.

Five alleged gunmen facing murder charges before the Manila Regional Trial Court have recanted, and there could be more suspects to do the same, Villanueva said during the interview aired on Cignal TV’s “One News.”

“Definitely, we expect that more recantations would be coming, because as early as April, when the court ordered the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) to allow us to visit and talk to our four clients, the others told us that they also suffered threats and torture and that their confessions were made under duress,” Villanueva said in Filipino.

Police and the Department of Justice (DOJ) have denied the allegations of torture to force the suspects to confess.

Joven Javier, Romel Pattaguan, Dahniel Lora, Jhudiel/Osmundo Rivero, and Rogelio Antipolo Jr. have availed his services upon request of their families, and it was “malicious” to think the alleged mastermind suspended congressman Arnolfo Teves Jr. was behind it, Villanueva added.

His clients alleged that they were tortured to force their confession and threatened that their lives would be in danger if they did not cooperate.

Villanueva denied that his clients were forced or bribed by the Teves camp to turn back on their earlier confessions that they were hired to carry out the March 4 attack on Degamo’s residential complex in Pamplona that killed nine others.

“It is a malicious allegation that we were paid to coach or to force our clients,” Villanueva said.

Besides the five who had recanted, the others who were arrested by authorities and facing murder, frustrated murder, and attempted murder charges before the Manila Regional Trial Court Branch 51 are Winrich Isturis, Eulogio Gonyon Jr., and John Louie Gonyon.

Teves’ right hand man Marvin Miranda was earlier indicted by the Department of Justice prosecutors for his hand in the deaths and injuries sustained by survivors of what came to be known as the “Pamplona massacre.”

With cases over the massacre ordered by the Supreme Court transferred from Negros Oriental courts to Manila, DOJ prosecutors are consolidating the cases against the other suspects.

Authorities earlier identified a total of 11 suspects who allegedly conspired with Teves to launch the attack, with a 12th suspect killed in a hot pursuit operation. — (FREEMAN)