Court clears way for trial of bar exams blast suspect

The Court of Appeals (CA) has paved the way for the prosecution of a fraternity member tagged in a grenade explosion on the final day of the 2010 bar exams that resulted in two law students losing their legs.

In a 17-page decision, the appellate court’s Special Fourth Division upheld the Department of Justice resolution indicting Anthony Nepomuceno, a member of the Alpha Phi Omega fraternity, in the blast that also wounded several other students.

The ruling paves the way for the case to proceed to trial, after investigating prosecutor Gerard Gaerlan’s finding on April 27, 2011, of probable cause to charge Nepomuceno with multiple frustrated murder, multiple attempted murder and illegal possession of an explosive.

The court also upheld Gaerlan’s Oct. 10, 2011, resolution denying Nepomuceno’s appeal of his indictment.

No grave abuse

“Even on the merits of the petition, we find… that the investigating prosecutor did not commit grave abuse of discretion amounting to excess or lack of jurisdiction in recommending the filing of information against Nepomuceno,” the court said.

Penned by Associate Justice Francisco Acosta, the ruling said the petition for certiorari Nepomuceno filed in the CA was not the proper remedy, as “the proper recourse” was a petition for review before the secretary of justice.

The court also junked Nepomuceno’s questioning of the credibility of the witnesses, who had pointed to him as the one who threw a grenade outside De La Salle University, the venue of the bar exams, on Sept. 26, 2010.

“A plain reading of the instant petition shows that what Nepomuceno primarily questions is the appreciation given by the investigating prosecutor on the accounts of the witnesses which Nepomuceno believes to be highly incredible and inconsistent; and the procedure which the NBI followed which Nepomuceno believes to have been irregular,” said the ruling.

It said such questions were better argued during the trial proper.