MANILA – Saying that he is not a “flight risk,” a Makati City Regional Trial Court (RTC) has granted Sen. Antonio Trillanes IV’s request to travel overseas this December and on early January.
In an order released by the Makati City RTC Branch 150, Trillanes requested to be allowed to travel to Europe from Dec. 11 to Jan. 12 and to the United States from Jan. 27 to Feb. 10, 2019 was granted.
Trillanes sought for the Makati court’s nod to travel abroad after receiving invitations from various groups in the Netherlands, Spain, and United Kingdom for a series of activities.
Makati City RTC Branch 150 Judge Elmo Alameda said that his court decided to grant Trillanes’ request since he has no intention to run from his cases, as shown by his past actions when the court issued an arrest warrant against him.
“Trillanes voluntarily surrendered and posted bail in this case immediately upon service of the warrant of his arrest and that he has always returned to this country in those instances where he was permitted by the courts to travel abroad,” the document read.
Trillanes is facing rebellion charges under the watch of Alameda for his role in the 2011 Manila Peninsula siege during the time of former President and now Pampanga representative Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo.
Recently, Alameda issued an arrest warrant and hold departure order on Trillanes as per the request of the Department of Justice after President Rodrigo Duterte revoked the amnesty provided to the embattled senator. Trillanes was able post bail.
Aside from the case in Branch 150, the DOJ also has the same petition at the Makati City RTC Branch 148, which handles the coup d’etat case of Trillanes for his role in the 2003 Oakwood Mutiny./PN
