At a glance:

• Claim: Justice Secretary Menardo Guevarra confirmed that former senator Antonio Trillanes IV will be jailed again.
• Rating: FALSE
• The facts: Guevarra did not say anything like this. He only said that Trillanes should not celebrate the junking of his rebellion case by the Court of Appeals (CA) just yet, because the “battle is far from over.” 
• Why we fact-checked this: A reader emailed the video containing the claim for verification. As of writing, the videos containing this claim had over 125,440 views combined.

Complete details:

Facebook page “Top News Online” posted a video on Friday, April 16, that falsely claimed Justice Secretary Menardo Guevarra confirmed that former senator Antonio Trillanes IV will soon be jailed again.

The page titled its video: “JUST IN: DOJ Sec GUEVARRA, KINUMPIRMANG Muling MAKUKULONG si TRILLANES| ‘MAGHIHIMAS KANA (sic) NG REHAS!’ (Just in: DOJ Secretary Guevarra confirmed Trillanes will be jailed again! ‘You will soon be behind bars!’)” The video then cited an Inquirer.net article published on March 4 as its source.

The video was originally uploaded on YouTube by channel “Showbiz Fanaticz.” As of writing the two videos had over 125,440 views combined. A reader emailed the post by “Top News Online” to Rappler for verification.

This claim is false. Guevarra did not say anything like this. The Inquirer.net article cited in the video also did not quote Guevarra as saying that Trillanes will soon be jailed again.

In the Inquirer.net article, Guevarra was only quoted as saying that Trillanes should not celebrate the junking of his rebellion case by the Court of Appeals (CA) just yet.

“It [the junking of the rebellion case] opens a number of legal options to the government. And if I may say, the battle is certainly far from over,” Inquirer.net quoted Guevarra as saying in a Viber message to reporters.

The report also said that Guevarra would discuss the next legal move of the government with Solicitor General Jose Calida.

In a CA ruling dated March 1, the appellate court reversed the order of Makati Regional Trial Court (RTC) Branch 150 Judge Elmo Alameda that reopened the rebellion trial of Trillanes. But this happened without invalidating President Rodrigo Duterte’s proclamation that revoked the amnesty granted to Trillanes.

Rappler earlier debunked a similar claim that Duterte confirmed he will have Trillanes imprisoned again. Duterte has not commented on the CA ruling as well.

Both the Facebook page “Top News Online” and YouTube channel “Showbiz Fanaticz” have a history of uploading videos with false information. – Pauline Macaraeg/Rappler.com

Keep us aware of suspicious Facebook pages, groups, accounts, websites, articles, or photos in your network by contacting us at factcheck@rappler.com. Let us battle disinformation one Fact Check at a time.

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