MANILA – President Rodrigo Duterte ordered the Department of Justice (DOJ) and the Bureau of Corrections (BuCor) not to release convicted rapist-murderer Antonio Sanchez, said Sen. Christopher “Bong” Go.
He added that Duterte recently made the directive to DOJ secretary Menardo Guevarra and BuCor chief Nicanor Faeldon.
“Nung nalaman ni Pangulong Duterte ‘yang balitang ‘yan, ipinarating niya po kay BuCor chief Nick Faeldon at kay Secretary Guevarra na huwag i-release (si Sanchez) upon the order of the higher authority,” Go said.
“Sino pa ba ang higher authority? Not higher authorities, higher authority. Ibig sabihin ang Pangulo,” he added.
Duterte went ballistic, according to Go, when he learned that the former mayor of Calauan, Laguna could be one of the beneficiaries of early detention release due to “good conduct” in prison.
“Abugado po ang Pangulo. Pinag-aaralan niya ang batas. Excluded po siya (Sanchez) dun sa Republic Act No. 10592. Sa Section 1, excluded ang lahat ng heinous crimes,” Go said.
Sanchez, who was convicted for the 1993 rape-murder of University of the Philippines Los Baños student Eileen Sarmenta, and the murder of her companion Allan Gomez, was among the beneficiaries of the ruling, according to Guevarra last week.
Sanchez’s good conduct time allowances were recomputed by the Bureau of Corrections and that Sanchez could be a free man following 2013 amendments to provisions of the Revised Penal Code on good conduct time grants.
Republic Act 10592 amends provisions of the law on the sentence reductions of a convicted prisoner or an inmate on preventive imprisonment based on good conduct.
The law was initially made prospective in application, meaning it will only apply to cases that occurred after it was enacted in 2013 but a Supreme Court verdict on June 25 changed the application to retroactive, effectively covering more inmates./PN
