MANILA, Philippines – The Court of Appeals (CA) issued a freeze order on the assets of 4 former congressmen and 6 staff members of lawmakers who are facing charges for their alleged participation in the multi-billion-peso pork barrel scam.

In a 43-page resolution issued by Associate Justice Manuel Barrios of the CA Former Second Division, the bank accounts of the following lawmakers were ordered frozen for 3 months:

• former APEC party-list Rep. Edgar Valdez
• former Agusan Del Sur Rep. Rodolfo Plaza
• former Benguet Rep. Samuel Dangwa
• former Cagayan de Oro Rep Constantino Jaraula

Staff members of accused lawmakers were included as well, including:

• Atty. Jessica Lucila “Gigi” Reyes (chief of staff, Sen Juan Ponce Enrile)
• Richard Cambe (chief of staff of Sen Ramon “Bong” Revilla Jr)
• Ruby Tuason (rep of of Enrile and Sen Jinggoy Estrada)
• Pauline Labayen (staff of Estrada)
• Jose Sumalpong (chief of staff of former Masbate Rep Rizalina Seachon-Lanete)
• Erwin Dangwa (chief of staff of Dangwa)

Associate Justices Remedios Salazar-Fernando and Normandie Pizarro concurred in the decision.

The 10 are among the 38 people charged with plunder, malversation of funds, bribery, and graft and corruption in connection with the scam, that involved alleged mastermind Janet Lim-Napoles. She reportedly connived with lawmakers to channel their Priority Development Assistance Fund (PDAF) to her bogus non-governmental organizations in exchange for hefty kickbacks.

In August, the same month the case was filed with the Office of the Ombudsman, the CA ordered frozen some 400 bank accounts of Napoles, her relatives, and dummies.

Curiously, of the top 5 lawmakers accused of plunder and of amassing the most amount of money, only Valdez was issued a freeze order. The other 4 – Senators Jingoy Estrada, Juan Ponce Enrile, and Ramon “Bong” Revilla Jr, and former Congresswoman Rizalina Seachon-Lanete who is now governor of Masbate – were spared.

The staff of the 4 however, were included in the freeze order.

The CA served the freeze order to banks on Wednesday, November 27, who were given 24 hours to show proof of compliance.

Meanwhile, the second batch of cases related to the pork barrel scam will be filed by the DOJ on Friday, November 29. 

Why just 10?

But Justice Secretary Leila de Lima said the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI), which led the probe into the pork barrel scam and which falls under the Department of Justice (DOJ), wants the freeze order to include all 38 and not just 11.

She said the decision not to include the 3 senators in the freeze order was the decision of the Anti-Money Laundering Council (AMLC), which, according to her, has its own process and “discrete investigation.” De Lima said she does “not want to pressure AMLC.”

“They know what they are doing. They know what do, all the info and data they need are there before they ask the CA to freeze the assets of those being charged,” she said.

Levi Baligod, the lawyer of the whistleblowers who also exposed the scam, expressed disappointment at the limited freeze order, telling Rappler, “[it’s] sad. Because it should have been all 38.”

Despite the initial order, de Lima said the NBI is currently working on freezing the assets of all respondents in the cases.

“The NBI is closely coordinating with AMLC in respect to those other courses of action-freezing of assets of others who are implicated,” she said.

De Lima also said “as far as the NBI is concerned hopefully all will be included” in the freeze order, because the NBI believes the scam would not have worked without everyone’s participation.

“The position of the NBI is that there is a conspiracy and therefore everyone is culpable even if they have varying levels of participation or roles in the scheme. We treat them all as co-conspirators because the act of one is the act of all,” she said.

She did however maintain the NBI’s position that the “brains of the PDAF scam is Mrs. Napoles.”

Napoles is currently being detained in Laguna for a separate serious illegal detention case for the kidnapping of her personal assistant turned whistleblower, Benhur Luy. She insists she has nothing to do with the pork barrel scam.- Rappler.com