DOJ allows Rolito Go to leave prison for cancer treatment

VIP PRISONER Rolito Go comes and goes at the New Bilibid Prison. RAFFY LERMA

MANILA, Philippines—Justice Secretary Leila de Lima has allowed murder convict Rolito Go to temporarily leave the New Bilibid Prisons (NBP) in Muntinlupa for specified periods to undergo chemotherapy treatment for colorectal cancer.

De Lima approved the request of Manuel Co, officer-in-charge of the Bureau of Corrections, which supervises the NBP. Co approved a recommendation from Dr. Samuel Ang, the state prison’s medical chief and Go’s attending surgeon, for the convict to undergo chemotherapy sessions at the Chinese General Hospital (CGH) in Manila.

Go will be allowed to go to the CGH for the procedure for three to five successive days a month for a period of four to six consecutive months, depending on his response to the treatment, De Lima said.

“This shall be subject to strict compliance with prison rules and regulations, with the NBP detailing the manpower security complement consisting of at least two custodial personnel per shift on a three-shift basis with one senior custodial inspectorate who will go around the hospital to conduct random inspection and the escorting route will strictly be from NBP to hospital and back,” the justice secretary said.

“It is understood that all expenses that may be incurred in the course of the treatment will be shouldered by the subject inmate,” she said.

The procedure will be administered by Dr. Juanita Lu Lim, an oncologist at the CGH.

De Lima designated Co as prison OIC after Bureau of Corrections director Gaudencio Pangilinan Jr. went on leave following the controversy over Go’s disappearance from the NBP last month.

President Aquino asked De Lima to take over Pangilinan’s duties while the latter is on leave.

Go and his nurse disappeared from the NBP premises last month and was believed to have escaped. He and his family, however, claimed he was abducted for ransom.

The convict claimed that his kidnappers, who he said had posed as agents of the National Bureau of Investigation, initially demanded P1 million for his release but later abandoned him and his nurse in Batangas for unknown reasons.