Murder raps vs Leyble et al. dismissed

Describing the evidence presented in the complaint as “hearsay, speculation and conjecture,” the Antipolo City Prosecutor’s Office dismissed last week the murder charges filed against former Antipolo Mayor Nilo Leyble and six other people in connection with the killing of an alleged hitman.

In a six-page resolution dated Oct. 8, Assistant City Prosecutor Edgar Namia said that Dorina Laroco and witnesses Moises Provido and Alvin de la Cruz failed to show that Leyble, incumbent Antipolo Vice Mayor Puto Leyva, former Barangay (village) San Luis chair Andrei Zapanta and former Barangay San Luis treasurer Alfred Garcia were behind the death of Laroco’s husband, Rolando.

Similar charges against co-respondents Danilo Aquino, Ricky Reyes and Tin tin Garcia were also dismissed but the resolution—recommended for approval by Deputy City Prosecutor Gerardo Barot and approved by Antipolo City Prosecutor’s Office officer in charge Mario Rosario Luna—did not say whether the case against a certain Jan-jan had also been thrown out.

Laroco earlier claimed that her husband, Rolando, who was shot 14 times in an ambush on Aug. 26, was part of a group hired by Leyble, Leyva, Zapanta and Garcia to assassinate Antipolo Mayor Jun Ynares and his father, former Rizal Gov. Ito Ynares.

She said that the other members of the group were Provido, De la Cruz, Aquino, Reyes and Jan-jan. Tin tin Garcia, on the other hand, was linked to the case because she was Jan-jan’s girlfriend.

According to Laroco, her husband was killed by Leyble and the other accused after he decided to back out of the assassination plot. Leyble has denied her allegation, which he branded as political harassment. He lost to the younger Ynares when he ran for reelection in May.

The prosecutor, meanwhile, noted in his resolution that Laroco’s testimony did “not provide much help in shedding light” on her husband’s death as it contained more information about what Rolando knew about “the alleged plot to kill the Ynareses.”

He also noted that Laroco was not an eyewitness to her husband’s death as she learned about it only from a responding officer who went to the crime scene.

“While [she] seemed to imply that Alfred Garcia had lured her husband into going to Antipolo City only to be killed, the evidence along this line is [flimsy]. This kind of evidence cannot even be properly called ‘hearsay.’ It is simply not evidence at all,” the prosecutor said.

He went on to say that Laroco’s “knowledge about her husband’s death” bordered on “the realm of speculation and conjecture.”

Not credible as a witness

The prosecutor also questioned her credibility as a witness as he noted that she had withheld from the police the true identity of “Kua” who had supposedly exchanged messages with her husband hours before he was killed.

According to him, a police progress report had described Laroco as having “no knowledge or information about the identity of ‘Kua.’”

“Indeed if she knew the identity of ‘Kua’ at the onset and knowing very well that the same is vital to the investigation and in solving the murder of her husband, why would she withhold that information? Verily, we are once again reminded of the dictum that a testimony must not only be credible but must also come from a credible witness,” the prosecutor said in his resolution.

He added that the evidence presented by Laroco on the supposed participation of Alfred Garcia’s co-respondents, including Leyble, were also “devoid of any evidentiary value.”

While he said that he “sympathized” with Laroco over her husband’s death, he was also “duty-bound not to indict any person if the same is not warranted by evidence.”

“It is enough that a wrong was committed against Rolando (Laroco) but for us to compound [it] by committing another under the guise of bringing the culprits for his death before the bar of justice even without evidence would be the height of injustice,” he added.

As for Provido’s statement that Leyble was the “financier” of the group, the prosecutor said that it was “inadmissible as evidence” as Provido had relied only on the information provided him by “Jan-jan.”

This meant that the information provided by Provido could only be “hearsay” since its “probative force depends in whole or in part on the competency and credibility” of another person.