Trillanes asks SC anew to stop proclamation voiding his amnesty

FILE: TRILLANES FACES THE MEDIA. Senator Antonio Trilllanes IV issues a statement to the media, with Minority Floor Leader Senator Franklin Drilon (right) and Senator Risa Hontiveros (left), about the revocation of his amnesty by Malacañang on Tuesday (Sept. 4, 2018). (PNA photo by Avito C. Dalan)

MANILA — Lawyers of Senator Antonio Trillanes IV on Thursday asked the Supreme Court (SC) anew to stop the implementation of President Rodrigo Duterte’s Proclamation No. 572 which declared the amnesty granted by the previous administration to him as void ab initio (from the beginning).

In his 80-page mailed pleading in reply to the government’s comment on the case dated Nov. 6, Trillanes sought a writ of preliminary injunction be issued prohibiting the government from implementing the proclamation.

In September, the Office of the Solicitor General (OSG) urged the High Court to make permanent its denial of Trillanes’ plea to halt the nullification of his amnesty.

In filing its 200-page comment on the case, the OSG maintained that Duterte’s proclamation voiding Trillanes’ amnesty has sufficient basis.

The OSG also questioned Trillanes’ signature on his petition after it found out that the notary public, who supposedly administered the oath, had no records of entering the Senate on the indicated date.

Trillanes, in his pleading, particularly sought an injunction specifically against provisions of the proclamation ordering the Department of Justice and the Armed Forces of the Philippines to “pursue all criminal and administrative cases filed against him” in relation to the Oakwood Mutiny and the Manila Peninsula Incident” and the provision ordering the military and the police “to employ all lawful means to apprehend (him) so he can be recommitted to the detention facility where he had been incarcerated for him to stand trial for the crimes he is charged with.”

“The amnesty granted to petitioner which resulted to the dismissal of the cases against him is the product of the official acts of all three of the great branches of government, the executive department in issuing Proclamation No. 75, the legislative department in passing and adopting concurrent resolution no. 4 and the judiciary department through the trial courts’ dismissal of the cases before them. Indubitably, these actions of the three great branches of government in effect concurring in the amnesty granted to the petitioner likewise enjoy the presumption of regularity,” the opposition senator said.

Trillanes added that the government can no longer insist on his prosecution.

“To begin with, the foregoing argument could only be true if the criminal prosecution were still pending and not in this case when the criminal cases were already dismissed some seven years ago, which dismissal may we add are not only final and executory but fully and completely implemented,” he added.