DETAINED-SENATOR Jose “Jinggoy” Estrada is asking the Sandiganbayan to allow him to leave detention so that he could have his painful shoulder checked at a hospital in San Juan City.
In a motion filed before the Sandiganbayan Fifth Division Monday, Estrada said he would need three hours for the check-up at the Cardinal Santos Medical Center in Greenhills.
The lawmaker detained for plunder over the pork barrel scam said his aching shoulders were the subject of a therapy session last year. The court granted his request for medical check-up.
BACKSTORY: Jinggoy Estrada complains of worse shoulder pains while in jail
“After the permitted therapy sessions, (Estrada) had not been clinically examined to determine the results of the aforesaid therapy session,” the motion said.
Estrada said he had been experiencing pain in his left shoulder since last year.
“For the past weeks, the pain in his left shoulder had been increasing and last week till last night had been unbearable,” the motion said.
In its comment opposition, government lawyers said Estrada did not give proof that the unbearable pain in his shoulders cannot be treated at the PNP General Hospital, or near his detention room at the PNP Custodial Center.
“To the mind of the prosecution, if Estrada is really suffering from an unbearable pain on his left shoulder, he should have requested that he be brought to the PNP General Hospital,” the prosecutors said.
Without proof that the pain on his shoulders need treatment outside his detention area, prosecutors said Estrada’s motion is “self-serving.”
“Indeed, Estrada failed to provide sufficient basis to support his assertions, which claims remain unsubstantiated and self-serving, leaving this Honorable Court with nothing upon which to anchor its assessment for the purpose of granting his motion,” prosecutors said.
Estrada is detained with fellow Senator Ramon “Bong” Revilla Jr. for plunder over the alleged pillaging of lawmakers’ funds through a scam purportedly masterminded by Janet Lim-Napoles.
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