THE Sandiganbayan found former Davao Oriental Mayor and other municipal officials guilty for medicine fraud.
Ombudsman in a press release posted last Thursday in their website stated that they won conviction against former Baganga, Davao Oriental Mayor Gerry Morales and former municipal officials in connection with the 2001 procurement of 11,000 pieces of Mebendazole tablets worth P196,900.
In a 21-page Decision of the Sandiganbayan, Morales, along with former municipal officials; namely: Emeritos Jovilla, Francisco Jimenez and Reymundo Escamillan, were found guilty beyond reasonable doubt of violating Section 3(e) of the Anti-Graft and Corrupt Practices Act (Republic Act No. 3019).
The statement read that Ombudsman prosecutors proved during trial that the accused connived with each other and acted with evident bad faith in procuring 110 de-worming tablets under the guise of emergency purchase to avoid the law on competitive public bidding.
“The supporting documents for the said transaction were highly questionable as they lacked signatures with the sales invoice issued before the purchase order. The inconsistent averments of the accused have also pinned them down,” The anti-graft court said, “[t]heir inconsistencies lead this Court to believe that they attempted to circumvent the more exacting rules for public bidding by classifying the procurement as an emergency purchase.”
“[M]edicine for deworming cannot be, in all honesty, considered as an emergency purchase even in the face of a Sangguniang Bayan Resolution which states that there is a calamity,” the court added.
The four of them are sentenced to suffer six to 10 years of imprisonment with the accessory penalty of perpetual disqualification from holding public office. They were also ordered to indemnify the government the amount of P196,900 as civil liability.
Earlier this year, Morales was likewise convicted by the Sandiganbayan over irregular purchase of oil and grease, sentencing him to six up to ten years imprisonment.