Partido Reporma chairman and presidential aspirant Sen. Panfilo “Ping” Lacson refuted perennial accusations that he ran away from the law when he left the country in 2010 or about a month before an arrest warrant could be served against him.
The arrest warrant, Lacson said was based on politically motivated charges filed against him by the Arroyo government when he was implicated in the Dacer-Corobito double murder case.
Lacson was among then President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo’s fiercest critics at that time, having exposed large-scale corruption scandals that happened during her administration.
Lacson clarified the matter In his interview during an interview for May 2022 presidential candidates hosted by Jessica Soho on Saturday night, saying he simply availed of an existing jurisprudence that allowed him to defense himself in the court of law.
“I did not break any law. There was jurisprudence in which an accused with a warrant of arrest is allowed to file pleadings. When I left, there was no warrant of arrest yet. I did not violate any law because there was no hold departure order against me,” Lacson said in Filipino during the televised interview.
The senator said he heeded the advice of his legal counsel for him to remain in self-exile at the time, considering the hostile political environment.
He also said there was already a Supreme Court ruling that allowed an accuser to make himself scarce while his case goes on trial.
Also, with the help of his lawyer who represented him during court proceedings, Lacson said he was able to defend himself within the criminal justice system of the country.
“If we followed the previous jurisprudence, that would be a Catch-22 situation for me because my case would not proceed if I was not under the legal custody of the court; meaning, I would have to surrender myself. It just so happened that there was a new jurisprudence and I took that option,” he explained.
Eventually, Lacson was exonerated from the charges after the Court of Appeals (CA) found there is lack of substantial and even circumstantial evidence against him.
“That was the kind of injustice that was done to me and I did not want to give Mrs. Arroyo the satisfaction at the time to see me behind bars—not even for a second,” he said.
“So, I swore to myself: ‘You will never catch me. I will fight the case in the best and legal way that I can’,” he stressed.
Lacson returned to the country in 2011 after the Supreme Court upheld the CA ruling. He has since then accepted the apologies of those who one tried to implicate him in the controversy.