Detained and outgoing Senator Leila de Lima welcomed the dismissal of a drug case against Kerwin Espinosa, saying this strengthens her position that the cases she is facing are "fabricated."
In a ruling dated May 30, the Makati Regional Trial Court Branch 64 dismissed the motion for reconsideration filed by the prosecution to overturn the court’s ruling last December, which granted Espinosa’s demurrer to evidence that is equivalent to the dismissal of the case.
"Again, the court in Espinosa's case only reiterated that the testimony of Espinosa before the Senate cannot be relied upon as evidence even against Espinosa himself. In the first place, Espinosa has already recanted his Senate testimony,” said De Lima.
De Lima, who has been detained for more than fives years, is facing two drug cases before Muntinlupa courts for conspiracy to commit illegal drug trading, which allegedly happened during her stint as justice secretary before she became a senator.
The Department of Justice (DOJ) filed three cases against De Lima in February 2017. One of the cases was dismissed by a Muntinlupa court in February last year.
“So insofar as I am concerned, with the court's ruling and Espinosa's recantation, Espinosa's Senate testimony has already been conclusively proven to be unreliable as evidence against me,” the senator said.
De Lima added that “from the very start, even the DOJ desisted from including the Espinosa case in the charges they filed against me. As early as 2017, the DOJ already realized that the Espinosa fairy tale narrated at the Senate would not make the cut even in a Duterte-controlled court setting.”
“Espinosa's senate testimony was a purely fabricated story forced upon both Espinosa and Dayan upon the orchestration of Duterte's henchmen and operators. The fact that all of this is coming out as Duterte's term ends indicates that the Duterte Admin's cases against me are purely manufactured and fabricated in order to persecute, destroy, and silence me,” she said.
Espinosa’s counter-affidavit
In April, Espinosa executed a counter-affidavit regarding a Department of Justice-ordered investigation into his illegal drug trade activities at the New Bilibid Prison (NBP) in Muntinlupa based on his extra-judicial confession he made during the Senate investigation into the killing of his father, Mayor Rolando Espinosa Sr. conducted in November and December 2016.
He said the National Bureau of Investigation filed charges against him “hoping that respondent Espinosa will cooperate and affirm in various Courts his testimony given during the Senate hearings held on 23 November 2016 and 5 December 2016, but Espinosa has no intention of doing so since he was only coerced, pressured, intimidated, and seriously threatened by the police.”
Espinosa also said all his statements against De Lima are false.
“Finally, any and all of his statements given during the Senate hearings, or in the form of sworn affidavits, against Senator Leila De Lima are not true. He has no dealings with Sen. De Lima and has not given her any money at any given time,” said Espinosa in the counter-affidavit.
He added, “Any statement he made against the Senator are false and was the result only of pressure, coercion, intimidation, and serious threats to his life and family members from the police who instructed him to implicate the Senator into the illegal drug trade. For this, undersigned apologizes to Senator De Lima.”
In addition, Rafael Ragos, former officer-in-charge of the Bureau of Corrections and a key witness in one of De Lima’s cases, recanted all his allegations against the senator including his claim that he delivered P10 million to her residence in Paranaque in November and December 2012.
After Ragos recanted his statements, De Lima filed a motion and asked a Muntinlupa court to dismiss one of her cases.