De Lima, ex-lover face judge

Sen. Leila de Lima and her former driver and lover, Ronnie Dayan, on Friday faced the judge who ordered their arrest on Thursday on drug charges.

Judge Juanita Guerrero of the Muntinlupa City Regional Trial Court Branch 204 ordered the officers from the Philippine National Police Criminal Investigation and Detection Group who had arrested De Lima to take the senator to the PNP Custodial Center in Camp Crame, Quezon City, for detention while under trial.

Guerrero also ordered Dayan detained in the same police jail, where former Senators Jinggoy Estrada and Bong Revilla are held on plunder charges over the P10-billion pork barrel scam.

Former Bureau of Corrections chief Rafael Ragos, who had also been ordered arrested, did not show up, but was represented by his lawyer, Jeffrey Creuss, who filed an urgent motion to defer the issuance of a warrant for him.

The drug charges brought by the Department of Justice against De Lima are nonbailable. She is facing drug-related charges in two other branches of the Muntinlupa court.

At Branches 205 and 206 the judges reset the hearings after the prosecutors asked for a new date or more time to study De Lima’s motions.