A Navotas judge has denied a motion from a former Caloocan City policeman asking permission to seek the dismissal of the murder charges filed against him for lack of merit.
In her order dated Jan. 17 but released to the media on Monday, presiding Judge Romana del Rosario of the Navotas Regional Trial Court Branch 287 said there was a need for PO1 Jeffrey Perez’s camp to present evidence that would prove his innocence, therefore denying his petition seeking leave of court to file a demurrer.
She also stressed that all elements required by law to consider an incident a murder was present in the case filed against the suspect.
“In the present case, based only on the evidence submitted by the prosecution, it appears that all the elements prescribed by law are present,” Del Rosario said. Perez is accused of murdering 19-year-old Carl Arnaiz and 14-year-old Reynaldo “Kulot” de Guzman in August 2017, together with PO1 Ricky Arquilita. Both policemen claimed that the victims, who allegedly tried to rob a taxi driver, had resisted arrest.
An autopsy report showed that Arnaiz had sustained five gunshot wounds in the body and might have been tortured because of bruises on his body and handcuff marks on his wrists. De Guzman’s body, on the other hand, was found in a river in Nueva Ecija with around 30 stabwounds.
Arquilita, however, died while in detention on April 20, 2019 due to “massive blood loss, gastrointestinal bleeding and multiple liver nodules that were possibly malignant,” in addition to gallstones.
A demurrer to evidence is a plea for the dismissal of a case on the argument that there is no legal basis for a lawsuit, even if the evidence is already presented before the court. However, court rules dictate that the petitioner must first seek the court’s approval before filing a demurrer.