Niño’s legal team withdraws habeas corpus petition

The legal team of Bohol Provincial Board Member Niño Rey Boniel has withdrawn the petition that challenged the validity of the latter’s arrest.

0Lawyer Handel Lagunay said they verbally relayed on open court their intent to withdraw their petition for a writ of habeas corpus involving their clien, PB Member Boniel, during a hearing before Judge Marivic Trabajo-Daray of the Regional Trial Court Branch 52 of Talibon town in Bohol past 2 p.m. on Friday.

“After considering everything, we decided to withdraw our petition for a writ of habeas corpus. It is a collective decision by the legal team,” he told Cebu Daily News over the phone.

Lagunay, one of Niño’s six lawyers, refused to reveal in particular what prompted them to withdaw the petition, which was immediately granted by Daray.

Niño is the primary suspect in the killing of his wife, Mayor Mayor Gisela Boniel of Bien Unido town in Bohol, and throwing the latter’s body to the sea in between Cebu and Bohol last June 7.

He was arrested by the Bohol police upon the instructions of Chief Supt. Jonathan Cabal, head of the Regional Intelligence Division in Central Visayas (Rid 7), at around 10 p.m. last June 7, about 18 hours after his wife disappeared.

He was initially arrested for allegedly holding captive Gisela’s best friend Angela Leyson and the latter’s 17-year-old son inside the resort in Bien Unido, for which he now faced two counts of kidnapping and serious illegal detention charges filed before the Bohol Provincial Prosecutor’s Office on June 9.

But Judge Daray, on the same day, acting on the petition for a writ of habeas corpus filed by Niño’s lawyers, ordered the immediate release of the board member on the ground that the police failed to file criminal complaints against him within the 36 hours reglementary period.

The police, however, refused to heed the court order, insisting the first batch of criminal case against Niño was filed on time.

Parricide charges were eventually filed against Niño and his eight alleged cohorts at the Lapu-Lapu City Prosecutor’s Office, which has jurisdiction over the part of the sea where the victim’s body was reportedly killed and thrown.

A panel of prosecutors in Lapu-Lapu City on Tuesday ruled that the warrantless arrest made on Niño for the crime of parricide was valid.