Senator Leila de Lima during her 2016 visit to the Inquirer office in Makati for a roundtable interview after releasing an open letter to President Rodrigo Duterte regarding extrajudicial killings. (INQUIRER FILE PHOTO/ KIMBERLY DELA CRUZ
MANILA, Philippines — Detained former senator Leila de Lima’s bail pleas for her remaining drug case had been granted by the Muntinlupa City Regional Trial Court, said Lawyer Boni Tacardon.
De Lima’s co-accused former Bureau of Corrections chief Franklin Jesus Bucayu, de Lima’s former aide Ronnie Dayan, de Lima’s former security aide, Joenel Sanchez and Jad Dera were also allowed to post bail.
“Motions for reconsideration of the concerned accused are granted. Thus, the Order of the Court dated June 07, 2023, is reconsidered. Consequently, accused De Lima, Bucayu, Dayan, Sanchez and Dera are allowed to post bail in the amount of P300,000 each,” read the court’s order signed by Presiding Judge Gener M. Gito.
State prosecutors accused de Lima and Bucayu of tolerating the illegal drugs trade inside the national penitentiary from May 2013 to May 2015 when she was justice secretary.
De Lima has repeatedly denied the accusations, claiming she was a victim of a political witchhunt by then-president Rodrigo Duterte.
She said she earned the ire of Duterte due to her vocal stance against his administration’s bloody crackdown on illegal drugs and human rights violations.
Three drug charges have been filed against de Lima, and has already won two–through demurrer of evidence in February 2021 and the other through lack of merit of the prosecution’s case in May this year.
De Lima has been in detention at Camp Crame since February 2017.