PRESIDENT Duterte Tuesday, March 26, said at a PDP-Laban rally in Koronadal City, South Cotabato he had ordered the Lapu-Lapu City prosecutor to “recall his order of dismissal and have the guy (the teenage suspect in the murder of Christine Silawan) re-arrested.”
We don’t know how judges and lawyers would look at the open and public “meddling” of a president in the judicial process but that’s another matter. Let’s look instead at what Duterte calls a “modern” theory about “hot pursuit,” which must interest more the people following the Lapu-Lapu murder case.
The suspect, 17, is a former boyfriend of the high school girl whose body was found last March 11 on a vacant lot in Bankal, Lapu-Lapu. The corpse bore multiple stab wounds, its face skinned or acid-splashed and some internal organs removed. The suspect who was “last seen” publicly with her on March 10 was arrested March 16, or six days after the murder. The prosecutor ordered his release March 23, ruling that the warrantless arrest was illegal as it was not, contrary to what NBI alleged, in “hot pursuit.”
Old concept
The President disagreed with prosecutor’s order. His first reason: “Piskal ako.” He served as a fiscal (the old name for prosecutor) before he became mayor, congressman and president. Going forward, he said “hot pursuit” has a new concept. “(Hot pursuit) means there will be a chase. That chase is continuous. It’s continuous until you catch (the suspect) and then you file a case...”
[] “It is impossible that that a hot pursuit only takes 24 hours.”
[] “How can you make continuous support? If the suspects flee on an airplane, the police will be left behind.”
No actual chase
The President’s theory rests on the basis of an actual chase after a crime is committed, which may take much longer than a single day or require more time and more latitude, such as when the suspect flees on an airplane or a jet-ski.
The arrest of Christine’s ex-boyfriend, however, did not involve an actual chase by NBI or police. There was no suspect from Lapu-Lapu yet. Police eyes were on another possible “perp,” Jonas Bueno. Bueno’s status changed from “person of interest” to “primary suspect” after his arrest in Mindanao, but was later discarded when NBI witnesses tagged Christine’s former lover instead.
Reasons, time factor
In a past column “Hot pursuit and Imok’s killers” (SunStar, Dec. 4, 2017), I noted the reasons for the doctrine and the warrantless arrest under it: Delay may endanger the lives of law enforcers. Delay may enable the suspect to flee.
Ermita, Cebu City barangay chief Imok Rupinta was killed Nov. 23 and Jordan Gera, the second suspect in the murder, was arrested eight days later, on Dec. 1.
In counting time lapse, one may refer to the Supreme Court, which ruled these arrests as no longer covered by the “hot pursuit” rule: the next day (People vs. del Rosario), three days later (Posadas vs. Ombudsman); six days after the crime (People vs. Rolito Go).
The doctrine on “hot pursuit” requires “immediacy” and loses force after “an appreciable lapse of time.” And there must be “personal knowledge”: police or NBI, according to a primer by the late senator Miriam Defensor Santiago, should have “personal knowledge that the suspect committed the crime.”
Annoying but...
Fuss over the requirements of “hot pursuit” can be annoying, understandably for law enforcers who took time and pains to identify and build a case against the suspect.
But here’s the thing: Christine’s former boyfriend was not cleared by his release. He continues to be the respondent in the killing, charged before the prosecutor, and may be arrested with a warrant once probable cause is established.
The requirement is not just a technicality; it supports a substantial right. The 2011 kidnapping murder of Ella Joy Pique, a Minglanilla, Cebu grader in 2011–-in which two couples, one after the other, were indicted and later cleared for lack of evidence–-must have taught police and prosecutors a thing or two about shortcuts.