THE camps of Senator Ramon "Bong" Revilla Jr. and his former aid Richard Cambe on Saturday filed a motion for determination of probable cause in the plunder cases filed against them in connection with the alleged misuse of Priority Development Assistance Fund (PDAF).
Joel Bodegon, Revilla's counsel, went to Sandiganbayan Saturday morning to ask for the complete records of the preliminary investigations as well as for judicial determination of probable cause.
Revilla and Cambe also asked the court to suspend its hearings on the plunder cases and not to issue arrest warrants against the accused.
The Office of the Ombudsman on Friday filed plunder cases against Revilla, Senators Juan Ponce Enrile and Jinggoy Estrada and businesswoman Janet Napoles, the alleged PDAF scam mastermind.
The three senators allegedly earned millions of pesos by funneling their PDAF allocations to the fake nongovernment organizations of Napoles.
The anti-graft court opened on Saturday to receive the motions to be filed by personalities named on the charge sheet.
Ombudsman Conchita Carpio-Morales on Friday asked the Supreme Court to create at least two Sandiganbayan Special Divisions to exclusively try and conduct continues trial of the cases involving the PDAF scam.
"National magnitude of these cases, the complexities of the issues involved, the number of accused and the far-reaching consequences of these cases," Morales said in her letter to Chief Justice Maria Lourdes Sereno.
Meanwhile, Morales formed a special prosecution panel, composed of three teams, to handle the first set of plunder cases against PDAF scam suspects.
The Prosecution Panel is co-chaired by Deputy Special Prosecutor John Turalba and Acting Deputy Special Prosecutor Manuel Soriano Jr.
The panel's first team is composed of Acting Director Janina Hidalgo as team leader with Assistant Special Prosecutors Edwin Gomez, Jennifer Agustin-Se and Annielyn Medes-Cabellis as members.
The second team is composed of Acting Director Danilo Lopez as team leader with Assistant Special Prosecutors Christina Marallag-Batacan, Anna Isabel Aurellano and Peter Jedd Boco as members while the third team is composed of Acting Director Joefferson Toribio as team leader with Assistant Special Prosecutors Jacinto Dela Cruz, Lyn Dimayuga and Emerita Francia as members. (Sunnex)