Castro to DOJ: Reverse junking of case vs Duterte

Rodrigo Duterte —VIDEOGRAB FROMFACEBOOK

ACT Teachers party list Rep. France Castro asked the Department of Justice (DOJ) on Monday to reverse a Quezon City prosecutor’s dismissal of her complaint against former President Rodrigo Duterte and charge him with two counts of grave threats.

In her petition filed in the DOJ, Castro, a member of the opposition Makabayan bloc, said that she was able to present “clear, positive and convincing evidence” as legal basis to hale Duterte to court for the crime of grave threats under Article 282 of the Revised Penal Code, in relation to Section 6 of Republic Act No. 10175, or the Cybercrime Prevention Act of 2012.

Her criminal complaint against the former president was dismissed on Jan. 9 due to insufficient evidence.

“Given Duterte’s repetitive grave threats and the fact of their continued and unfettered dissemination all over social media platforms even until today, it is ineluctably clear that there is a pervasively clear and present danger to [my] life, liberty and security …,” Castro said in her petition.

“The Red-taggings hurled by Duterte, coupled with threats of killing, should not be taken lightly nor dismissed as plain and meaningless utterances as the Quezon City office of the chief prosecutor did,” she added.

Basis for complaint

Castro’s complaint against the former president was based on his statements during his television show “Gikan sa Masa, para sa Masa” on Sonshine Media Network International network that aired on Oct. 11 and Nov. 16.

At the time, Castro was among the legislators who had spoken out against the confidential funds being sought by Vice President and Education Secretary Sara Duterte, Duterte’s daughter.

Sara’s requested P650 million confidential funds for 2024, however, were scrapped after the House decided to realign the allocation to government agencies tasked to defend the West Philippine Sea.

FranceCastro—PHOTO FROM FACEBOOK OF HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

In the Oct. 11 episode, Duterte, recalling a conversation he had with his daughter, mentioned the lawmaker’s name several times “accompanied by grave threats to kill her,” Castro said.

“But the first target of your intelligence funds should be you, France. I want to kill all of you communists,” she quoted the former president as saying on his TV program.

Threat repeated

In the Nov. 16 episode, Duterte repeated his threats against Castro even though the latter had already filed a criminal complaint against him for grave threats.

According to Castro, Duterte linked her to communist rebels who supposedly kill barangay officials that refuse to cooperate with them.

“If you do not cooperate or you are not with them, or you are a staunch … government worker, papatayin ka talaga. Yun ang trabaho ng bata-bata ni France. Kaya ikaw, France, how do you solve the problem now? Kaya yung statement ko yun komunista dapat patayin, kasali ka dapat,” she quoted Duterte as saying.

READ: Castro asks DOJ to annul dismissal of case vs ex-president Duterte

The lawmaker claimed that her complaint was dismissed because the Quezon City chief prosecutor interpreted Duterte’s statements as mere “sarcastic advice or suggestion or an opinion” meant for his daughter.

Castro lamented that the prosecutor considered the “public pronouncement of death threats” as “quite unusual if not ridiculous” to be considered seriously. INQ