Rafael Dumlao III and Jee Ick-joo. FILE PHOTO
The Court of Appeals (CA) has reversed the decision of an Angeles City court to acquit the mastermind of the gruesome murder of a Korean businessman in the early days of the Duterte administration’s drug war in 2016 after finding that the trial was a “sham” and an “apparent mockery” of the justice system, the Supreme Court said on Friday.
The Supreme Court said that dismissed Police Supt. Rafael Dumlao III was found guilty by the CA as a co-conspirator in the kidnapping and killing of Jee Ick-joo, who was strangled to death, cremated and his ashes flushed down a toilet.
READ: WHAT WENT BEFORE: Jee Ick-joo slaying
The CA’s June 26 ruling on a petition by state prosecutors to overturn his acquittal came a little more than a year after Dumlao was exonerated by Angeles City Regional Trial Court (RTC) Branch 60 on June 6, 2023.
The CA sentenced him to reclusion perpetua, or 20 to 40 years in prison, without parole, and was ordered to pay Jee’s family P350,000 in damages for kidnapping with homicide.
For kidnapping and serious illegal detention, he received another reclusion perpetua and ordered to pay Jee’s heirs P225,000 in damages, plus imprisonment for 30 to 35 years for carjacking.
“The Court of Appeals ruled that the proceedings before the RTC were a sham and an apparent mockery of the judicial process such that Dumlao’s acquittal was a foregone conclusion and in total disregard of the evidence,” the high court said in a statement.
“The Court of Appeals held that the RTC reached a conclusion that clearly contradicted the testimonies of witnesses, rendering the prosecution’s presentation of evidence inutile and blatantly abusing its discretion to a point so grave as to deprive it of its very power to dispense justice,” it said.
No double jeopardy
The high court said that an acquittal is usually final to avoid double jeopardy, but there is an exception to this general rule in cases of “grave abuse of discretion,” which the CA found in the Dumlao trial.
“This is strictly limited to instances where there is a violation of the prosecution’s right to due process, such as being denied the opportunity to present evidence, when the trial is a sham, or when there is a mistrial that renders the judgment of acquittal void,” it said.
The appellate court found that the RTC abused its discretion by its “gross misapprehension of the facts” in acquitting the ex-narc.
The CA did not alter the RTC’s decision and sentence on Dumlao’s coaccused, SPO3 Ricky Sta. Isabel and Jerry Omlang, a former errand boy for the National Bureau of Investigation.
The two men, who had identified Dumlao as the mastermind, were also convicted of abducting Marissa Marquicho, Jee’s house helper, and carjacking the Korean businessman’s vehicle.
Sta. Isabel and Omlang were sentenced by the Angeles RTC to two counts of reclusion perpetua without parole for kidnapping with homicide and kidnapping with serious illegal detention, and another 20 to 25 years for carjacking.
Another accused in the case, SPO4 Roy Villegas, became a state witness.
On Oct. 8, 2016, Jee was kidnapped by police officers led by Sta. Isabel at his residence in Friendship Subdivision in Angeles, under the guise of an antidrug operation.
According to Villegas who testified against Sta. Isabel, Jee’s body was cremated in Caloocan City, and the ashes were flushed down a toilet.
The CA said the cremation was done in a funeral parlor owned by Gerardo Santiago, who was charged as an accomplice. Santiago died in 2020.Dumlao was then head of a special investigation unit of the police Anti-Illegal Drugs Group, which was disbanded after Jee’s killing was exposed.
Strangled at Crame
A Department of Justice inquiry found that Jee was strangled inside his own car as it was parked in Camp Crame, Philippine National Police headquarters, hours after he was kidnapped.
Jee was reportedly a victim of the “tokhang for ransom scheme” where rogue police officers arrest individuals on drug-related charges and later extort money from them or their families in exchange for freedom.
Then President Rodrigo Duterte temporarily suspended his war on drugs after learning that it was being used as a cover for other crimes.
In February 2017, then PNP chief now Sen. Ronald dela Rosa said a “Korean mafia” preying on rich Koreans in the Philippines might have been involved in Jee’s murder.
But the chief of the PNP Anti-Kidnapping Group, Senior Supt. Glenn Dumlao, said two weeks later that their investigation supposedly showed that a Filipino crime syndicate, not the Korean mafia, killed Jee because he defied its attempts at extortion and encouraged other Korean and Chinese businessmen in the country to do the same.
It was revealed during the trial that Jee’s wife allegedly made a partial payment of P5 million of a total P8 million ransom demanded by his abductors. The trial court found no direct evidence linking any of the accused to the ransom demand.
Kidnapping for ransom and homicide charges for the abduction and killing of Jee were later brought against Dumlao, Sta. Isabel, Omlang and Villegas, who was later removed as a respondent for testifying against the others.In 2018, Dumlao was found guilty by the PNP for the administrative offense of grave misconduct for his involvement in the killing of Jee, resulting in his dismissal.
In 2019, Dumlao was allowed by the Angeles RTC to post bail after prosecutors supposedly failed to prove that the evidence of his guilt was strong. The court also reasoned that Dumlao’s actions, as relayed by witnesses, could not be considered an act of conspiring to kill the victim.
The PNP spokesperson did not immediately respond to the Inquirer’s request for comment. —WITH REPORTS FROM NESTOR CORRALES AND INQUIRER RESEARCH