Golden Buddha finder's heirs open to compromise
By Delmar Cariño
Northern Luzon Bureau
First Posted 00:22:00 05/21/2008
Filed Under: Crime, Law & Justice
BAGUIO CITY, Philippines -- Fearing protracted litigation on the estate of the late president Ferdinand Marcos in the United States, the heirs of Golden Buddha finder Rogelio Roxas said they are now open to a compromise on their damage claims against the Marcoses.
Lawyer Edgar Avila, counsel for Rogelio's sons, Henry and Gervic, said a New York court decision in February that granted the prayer for an interpleader of Merrill Lynch, Pierce, Fenner and Smith Inc., a New York-based bank, further blocked the heirs' legal claims.
Avila said the interpleader meant that the human rights victims during Marcos' martial law rule, the Philippine government, the Marcoses and Roxas' heirs would have to again slug it out before the foreign court to prove their rights to claim from the former dictator's estate.
The estate involved $2 million that the Marcoses transferred in 1972 to Arelma S.A., a Panamanian shell corporation, which in turn invested the amount in Merill Lynch.
The money had ballooned to $35 million in 2000 but the Philippine government managed to hold the Arelma portion of the account in escrow until the New York court ruled on the rightful claimants.
The compromise became an option, Avila said, since the interpleader would further delay the execution of the $6 million in damages a Hawaii court awarded the Roxases in October 1996.
"The interpleader has placed the Roxas award in suspended animation. The award, which earned an interest of 10 percent since 1996, could have been taken from the Merrill Lynch account," he said.
The proceedings for the interpleader could even be a setback for the Roxas award since the Philippine government further complicated the legal picture when it invoked its sovereign immunity, Avila said.
In international law, sovereign immunity meant that a case could not proceed against a foreign government unless it gave its consent to be sued.
Avila said: "The Philippine government, being one of the parties named in the interpleader, jeopardized the execution of the damage award in favor of the Roxases. This is why a compromise with the Marcoses appeared the best way to avoid legal entanglements."
The Roxases' claims against the Marcoses began in 1973 when Rogelio, a locksmith turned treasure hunter, accused Marcos of ordering soldiers to seize from his house here a Golden Buddha statuette worth billions of dollars because it supposedly contained precious gems in its hollow body.
Rogelio had said he found the statuette in a tunnel near a hospital here. He accused Marcos of returning a fake Buddha but the Marcos family had since denied the charges.
The Buddha statuette has remained in the custody of the regional trial court here for 35 years.
|
