The Taguig City Regional Trial Court (RTC) reset to Oct. 29 the arraignment set on Friday, Oct. 15, of Spanish national Francisco Manuel Sanchez de Oria, also known as Franco Sanchez, on charges of illegal sex with a 16-year-old Filipina and possession of child pornography.
“The arraignment of Sanchez did not push through because the detention facility had connectivity problems and they could not connect to the online hearing,” said Department of Justice (DOJ) Undersecretary Emmeline Aglipay-Villar.
Because of COVID-19 pandemic, court proceedings in the National Capital Region (NCR) and in many parts of the country are being conducted through video conferencing.
Sanchez has been detained at the Bureau of Immigration (BI) which is conducting deportation proceedings against him.
He was charged with 10 counts of violations of Republic Act No. 7610, the Special Protection of Children Against Child Abuse, Exploitation, and Discrimination Act, and one count of violation of RA 9775 or the Anti-Child Pornography Act.
He had filed before the RTC a motion to dismiss the charges but DOJ prosecutors opposed it, Villar said.
“The defense was given time to file a reply to the comment/opposition to the Motion to Dismiss of the accused,” she said.
The criminal charge sheet against Sanchez stated that he “willfully, unlawfully and feloniously have sexual intercourse” in Taguig City with the victim who was “a minor, fifteen (15) years old at the time of the commission of the offense, or a child exploited in prostitution or subject to other sexual abuse, to the damage and prejudice of said victim.”
The complaints against him were filed by the family of the 16-year-old girl, a student of an exclusive school in Metro Manila.
The charges against Sanchez had also filed by the same complainant against former United States foreign service officer Dean Edward Cheves before the Pasay City RTC which had issued an arrest order against him.
But Cheves is in the US where he was indicted by a federal grand jury in the Eastern District of Virginia last Aug. 3 for engaging in illicit sexual conduct in a foreign place and possession pornography.
He was a director of the US Embassy in Manila from September 2020 up to February 2021.