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Thursday, December 11, 2003
Fiscal handling King kidnapping case relieved
CEBU -- Cebu Provincial Prosecutor Cezar Tajanlangit will no longer handle cases involving Roderick Go, an accused in the kidnapping and attempt on the life of fellow businessman James King.
The Department of Justice (DOJ) on Wednesday removed him from the cases and sent these back to the Office of the Cebu City Prosecutor.
The relief, which happened a day before Go and his wife Grace were scheduled to face a US immigration court, comes with the instruction that the new handling prosecutor implement a March 27, 2003 resolution ordering that Grace be taken out as an accused.
Justice Secretary Simeon Datumanong, who had reversed Tajanlangit's findings on filing the criminal charges against the Gos, issued the March resolution.
However, Acting Justice Secretary Jose Calida was the one who signed the relief order, since Datumanong left for Mexico Wednesday.
"I will comply like a good soldier. I am just surprised why," Tajanlangit said in an interview.
The provincial prosecutor used his contacts in the US to trace Roderick and Grace after the couple went into hiding for one year and four months after attack on King.
Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) agents in Los Angeles arrested the Gos inside the house of Grace's aunt in the suburb of Sherman Oaks, California last Nov. 13.
Tajanlangit had trained with the FBI in anti-money laundering strategies.
"In the interest of public service and pursuant to existing laws, (the) department order...designating Tajanlangit to conduct the preliminary investigation (on the Go cases) is recalled. Accordingly, the Office of the City Prosecutor of Cebu is hereby designated to continue the preliminary investigation," the DOJ order said.
Sources questioned the timing of the order because Calida issued it a day before Malacaņang's Nov. 17, 2003 designation of Undersecretary Ma. Merceditas Gutierrez as acting secretary took effect.
Calida was Datumanong's choice as officer-in-charge in his absence but Malacaņang, through Executive Secretary Alberto Romulo, designated Gutierrez instead.
Gutierrez had approved Tajanlangit's resolution to file criminal charges against the Go couple.
The same sources also pointed out that DOJ didn't have to relieve Tajanlangit just to implement the March 27, 2003 resolution when Regional Trial Court Judge Olegario Sarmiento, sometime in April this year, already issued a restraining order against its implementation.
In an interview, Regional State Prosecutor Rey Delgado said neither Tajanlangit nor City Prosecutor Jose Pedrosa can implement the resolution because they are "duty-bound to obey the court in cases already filed before it."
Pedrosa, for his part, said he may just have to write Calida to inform him on the court's restraining order.
Tajanlangit, for his part, said he will stay away from the case, "until further instruction arrives."
Anyway, he said, the prosecution of the Go couple in the US is already being taken care of by the US Government. The spouses were arrested with expired visas.
In his affidavit-complaint, King said Roderick, armed with a box cutter, attacked him at the Metrobank-Plaridel branch parking lot last June 24, 2002.
Roderick's P90-million debt with King was allegedly the motive for the attack. Roderick has denied the allegations.
Sarmiento's restraining order, which cites judicial hierarchy, was issued after Go lawyer Wilfredo de Asis filed a motion to have it implemented. The motion wasn't filed on time as the King camp filed a petition for certiorari before the Court of Appeals.
The Go case was originally filed before the Office of the Cebu City Prosecutor, but the King family, through lawyer Rolindo Navarro, had the entire office inhibit from the case.
The case was then endorsed to the Office of the Provincial Prosecutor for hearing, with Tajanlangit penning a resolution to have it filed in court.
The Go couple, through their lawyers, posted bail and, despite a hold-departure order issued by the Bureau of Immigration, separately left for the US via Japan and South Korea. KNR
(December 11, 2003 issue)
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