The lawyer of the Archival family has requested the trial court to junk the plea to invalidate the search warant issued against five members of the Highway Patrol Group (HPG) who were implicated in the ambush-slay of lawyer Noel Archival and his companions.
In a pleading, lawyer Gloria Lastimosa-Dalawampu said a motion to quash and to suppress the evidence illegally obtained filed by the five HPG policemen is an “improper remedy.
“The question of whether there was abuse in the enforcement of the challenged search warrants is not within the scope of a motion to quash,” she explained.
In a motion to quash, Dalawampu said, what is assailed is the validity of the issuance of the warrant.
“The manner of serving the warrant and of effecting the search are not an issue to be resolved here,” she said.
Dalawampu said the five HPG policemen have remedies under pertinent penal, civil, and administrative laws.
Lawyer Inocencio dela Cerna earlier questioned the manner agents of the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) served the search warrant issued by Executive Judge Soliver Peras of the Regional Trial Court in Ceub City.
For one, Dela Cerna said, the lone survivor of the attack, Paolo Cortes, identified one of the cars used in the ambush as having the plate number GSR 995.
However, the red Toyota Vios seized by the NBI bears the plate number GSC 675.
Also, Dela Cerna contested how the NBI took the security logbook which showed that two vehicles getting in and out of the HPG impounding area before and after the ambush.
The two vehicles resemble the red Toyota Vios and the gray Mitsubishi Strada that were used by the perpetrators in killing Archival and his companions.
Dela Cerna said entries of the logbook, which was used as basis in identifying some of the suspects, should be nullified since it is a “fruit of a poisonous tree.”
He said the NBI agents should not have seized the logbook since it was not among the items which the court ordered them to confiscate.
Judge Peras, who issued the search warrant, has yet to rule on the pleadings filed by the parties.
In a related development, the PRO 7 is willing to give the Archival family necessary protection if needed according to PRO 7 deputy director for administration Senior Supt. Orlando Ualat.
Ualat said this following reports that the family of the slain lawyer received messages from an unknown texter saying something bad will happen to them if they will continue pursuing the case.
Cebu Provincial Police Office Director Noel Gillamac also said they will assess the threat and that they are willing to provide security to the family.
The police have been providing round-the-clock security to Cortes.
For his part, Cebu City Police Office (CCPO) director Noli Romana said he will talk with Councilor Archival to discuss security measures for their family.
Archival, along with his companions Candido Miñoza, Alejandro Jaime, and Cortes were ambushed inside their vehicle while traversing the national road in Dalaguete town, south Cebu from a hearing in Dumaguete City in the afternoon of Feb. 18, 2014.
Only Cortes, Archival’s on-call assistant, survived the attack.
The NBI filed charges of multiple and frustrated murder against Senior Supt. Romualdo Iglesia, Senior Supt. Joselito Lerion, Chief Insp. Eduardo Mara, SPO4 Edwin Galan, and PO1 Alex Bacani.
The respondents had asked Justice Secretary Leila de Lima to take over the case, saying Archival’s brother, Cebu City Councilor Nestor Archival, “wields considerable power and influence” which will compromise the investigation conducted by the Provincial Prosecutors’ Office.
De Lima has yet to resolve the motion./ With Angeli Sarmiento, UP Cebu Intern