CA affirms kidnap raps vs Palparan

The Court of Appeals (CA) on Tuesday upheld the kidnapping and serious illegal detention charges filed against retired Maj. Gen. Jovito Palparan. (Photo: Jovito Palparan/Facebook)

MANILA — The Court of Appeals (CA) on Tuesday upheld the kidnapping and serious illegal detention charges filed against retired Maj. Gen. Jovito Palparan.

In a 15-page decision dated Sept. 18, penned by Associate Justice Carmelita Salandanan Manahan and concurred by Associate Justices Fernanda Lampas Peralta and Elihu Ybanez, the CA’s 4th Division denied the petition for certiorari filed by Palparan.

The said petition seeks to recall the arrest warrant, as well as the dismissal of the charges filed against him over the 2006 abduction and disappearance of University of the Philippines (UP) students, Sherlyn Cadapan and Karen Empeño.

The CA said an order denying a motion to quash is merely an “interlocutory”, thus, not appealable nor can be the subject of a petition for certiorari.

“Stated differently, the remedy against the denial of a motion to quash is for the movant accused to enter a plea, go to trial, and should the decision be adverse, reiterate on appeal from the final judgment and assign as error the denial of the motion to quash,” read the decision.

“The denial, being an interlocutory order, is not appealable, and may not be the subject of a petition for certiorari because (of) the availability of other remedies in the ordinary course of law,” it added.

For the petition for certiorari questioning an interlocutory order to prosper, the CA said the appellant should be able to establish that the lower court issued the judgment or order without or in excess of jurisdiction or with grave abuse of discretion.

“Petitioner did not show that the trial court had no jurisdiction or exceeded its jurisdiction in denying the motion to quash, or gravely abused its discretion amounting to lack or excess of jurisdiction in its denial,” the CA noted.

The CA added that the allegations raised by Palparan in his petition for certiorari are factual and evidentiary in nature, which should be ventilated in a full-blown trial.

The appellate court did not give weight to Palparan’s arguments that the Malolos Regional Trial Court (RTC) disregarded his constitutional right to due process when it denied his motion to quash information and warrant of arrest on the same day it was filed on August 18, 2014.

The trial court, in denying Palparan’s motion, held that the motion was just a repetition of his earlier motion, which was already denied by the trial court in its order dated April 3, 2012.

It held that the grounds and issues mentioned in the motion to quash information and warrant of arrest were already passed upon in its April 3, 2012 resolution.

On Aug. 12, 2014, Palparan was arrested in a house in Sta. Mesa, Manila, after three years in hiding.

He was arrested by virtue of an arrest warrant issued by the Malolos RTC in 2011 in connection with the kidnapping and serious illegal detention charges filed by the relatives of the two missing UP students.

He has since been held in a detention cell in Camp Aguinaldo in Quezon City.

In indicting Palparan for kidnapping and serious illegal detention charges, the Department of Justice held that he had a direct hand in the detention of Cadapan and Empeño based on the testimony of Raymond Manalo, a farmer.