Suspended Negros Oriental 3rd District Rep. Arnolfo “Arnie” A. Teves Jr. opted not to file a counter-affidavit and instead asked the Department of Justice (DOJ) to dismiss the murder charges filed against him in the killings of Gov. Roel R. Degamo and nine other persons last March 4, 2023.
With Teves’ legal option, the DOJ’s panel of prosecutors decided on Monday, July 17, during the scheduled preliminary investigation to submit for resolution the multiple murder, multiple frustrated murder, and multiple attempted murder charges filed against the legislator.
Lawyer Andrei Bon Tagum, the legal counsel of the Degamo family, confirmed that the panel chaired by Senior Assistant State Prosecutor Mary Jane E. Sytat declared the case submitted for resolution based on the complaint filed by the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) against Teves and his co-respondents.
“The case is now being submitted for resolution on the basis of the evidence submitted by the NBI and of course on the other affidavits of the witnesses, including the earlier extrajudicial confessions filed by the witnesses,” Tagum said.
“The main respondent, Arnie Teves Jr., decided not to file a counter-affidavit. Of course, it is prejudicial to the general rule that a motion to dismiss is not allowed,” he also said.
In his motion to dismiss, Teves told the DOJ that the accusations against him “remain as bare allegations without proof.”
The motion pointed out that the complaint relied on the extra-judicial confessions of arrested suspects that stated that they and Teves were involved in the crime.
However, the motion noted that during one of the preliminary investigation hearings, “in a surprising turn of events, instead of submitting to the Special Panel’s desire, these Ten Suspects, with the assistance of their respective counsel de parte, declined to re-subscribe on their extra-judicial statements and, instead, executed and filed their respective Affidavits of Recantations, now forming part of the records of this case, retracting, repudiating, and disowning their earlier extra-judicial statements.”
“The common grounds that these Ten Suspects invoke for their recantations are that their earlier extrajudicial statements did not reflect the truth as they were pre-drafted for, or extracted from, them by NBI agents involuntarily or forcibly through coercion, threats, intimidation and torture, and that the public attorneys from the PAO (Public Attorney’s Office) which the NBI assigned to them did not actually guide them,” it cited.
Aside from Teves, the lawyer of his co-accused, helicopter pilot Capt. Lloyd Cruz Garcia, also submitted a motion to dismiss before the DOJ panel.
On the other hand, two other co-accused submitted before the panel their counter-affidavits that refuted the allegations in the complaint.
Those who filed counter-affidavits were Neil Andrew Go and detained suspect Nigel Electona, a former policeman who was arrested for illegal possession of firearms and explosives last March 24 at the HDJ Bayawan Agri-Ventures Corporation compound in Negros Oriental that is owned by Arnie’s brother, former Negros Oriental governor Pryde Henry Teves.