By Llanesca T Panti
Sen. Juan Ponce Enrile, his former chief-of-staff Jessica “Gigi” Reyes and Janet Napoles will spend Christmas, New Year and Valentine’s Day in detention because their trial for the plunder and graft, in connection with the pork barrel scam will start in May next year.
The prosecution and defence panels agreed on Friday that the preliminary conference — the time for marking the evidence, lawyers contesting them, discussions on plea bargaining, manifestation of objections and stipulation of facts —will only be held once a week starting October 16 and will be terminated after 20 meetings or by May 2015.
The agreement transpired after Enrile, Reyes and the other accused on 15 counts of graft were arraigned at the Sandiganbayan.
They were accused of making money out of public funds by channelling Enrile’s Priority Development Assistance Fund or pork barrel to the non-government organisations controlled by Napoles in exchange for kickbacks.
The prosecution will submit at least 2,000 pages of documents for the plunder and graft complaints filed against Enrile and his co-accused.
Aside from Enrile, Reyes and Napoles, there are 45 others accused in the graft cases, including officials and personnel of the Department of Budget and Management, state-owned Technology Resource Centre, National Development Livelihood Corporation and National Agribusiness Corporation.
Associate Justice Samuel Martires of the Sandiganbayan’s Third Division warned that with the sheer number of accused, the trial will surely be delayed.
“If you consider the number of accused in this case, the preliminary conference will take months. It would be a pity for those who are detained,” Martires explained.
Napoles’ lawyer Stephen David admitted that the lawyers of the accused will exhaust all legal remedies to turn the tide into their favour.
“You will have to mark all the evidences. Of course, the lawyers will object to that (markings). There are so many accused and so many lawyers. You will have to expect a lengthy preliminary conference,” David said.
Only Enrile, Reyes and Napoles are detained because plunder is a non-bailable offence.
Enrile, 90, is detained at the Philippine National Police General Hospital in Quezon City, while Reyes and Napoles are being held in the Bureau of Jail Management and Penology Female Dormitory in Taguig City.
