THE MAKATI City Prosecutor’s Office has found probable cause to indict for four counts of attempted murder a son of basketball legend and former Sen. Robert Jaworski, who was arrested after a botched entrapment operation on Sept. 19.
Senior Assistant City Prosecutor Gaudencio Tolledo Jr. also approved the filing of a case for unlawful possession of firearms against 40-year-old Ryan Joseph Jaworski but dismissed the charge of direct assault upon a person in authority.
In a 10-page resolution dated Oct. 13, Tolledo recommended the filing of attempted murder charges against the younger Jaworski despite his insistence that he was unarmed and did not fire upon PO2 Gerardo Navarro, PO3 Joel Sanchez, PO3 Richard Cenon and a police informant. He particularly cited the negative results of his paraffin test.
Tolledo said the suspect’s claims did “not hold water and the [paraffin] result does not preclude [him from] firing shots” since the test was conducted two days after the police operation. “There are factors that may affect the presence or absence of nitrates. This is well settled,” he added.
Tolledo also cited the bullet entry and exit holes found by the police on the rear window glass of the getaway vehicle used by the suspect and his alleged cohorts, Joselito Au and Ferdinand Parago. Three were mentioned: An entry and an exit hole on the right side of the rear window metal frame, and a secondary bullet hole on that same section of the vehicle.
“The entry hole was caused by a bullet fired in a downward direction from the rear side of the motor vehicle,” corroborating the “claim [that] Jaworski repeatedly shot (the police) when he and his companions were trying to extricate themselves,” Tolledo said.
The “evidence at hand” was also “sufficient to warrant the indictment for unlawful possession of firearm,” the prosecutor stressed.
Since the younger Jaworski had admitted offering for sale the gun found in the vehicle compartment—a 12-gauge shotgun that was not licensed to him or his companions—“he can be considered to have constructive possession of the firearm.”
“To be liable for possession of a loose firearm, actual possession is not required. Constructive possession over the loose firearm just like in the case under consideration is sufficient to hold [the suspect] liable therefore,” he added.
As for Jaworski’s claim that the firearm could not be admitted as evidence for being “a fruit of poisonous tree,” Toledo brushed it aside as having “no merit considering that the recovery of the gun appears to be the result of a hot pursuit operation.”
“It is evidentiary in nature which is better left for the appreciation of the court during the trial on the merits of the case,” he said.
Tolledo recommended bail for the suspect at P120,000 for each count of attempted murder as well as for the charge of illegal possession of firearm.
But he dismissed the charge of arms smuggling against Jaworski, noting that the appropriate violation cited by the police should have been “unlawful sale of firearms.”
Still, there was not enough probable cause to support the charge of unlawful sale of firearms since “there was no actual sale of the purported M4 Armalite rifle … and the same was not recovered.”
The complaint for direct assault upon an authority was also junked, as Tolledo ruled there was no proof that Jaworski knew that the persons he was dealing with were policemen. “To be liable therefore, it is required, among others, that the offender must have knowledge that the offended party was a person in authority or his agent in the exercise of his duties.”
The suspect countersued the police for frustrated murder and planting of evidence, but Tolledo tossed them out for insufficiency of evidence.
Jaworski and Au were arrested at Makati Medical Center on Sept. 19 after a tip led the police to the MMC where the senator’s son had sought treatment for a gunshot wound on the thigh.
The two men—along with Parago who remains at large—were the targets of an entrapment operation at the corner of Chino Roces and Arnaiz avenues in Makati City for alleged gunrunning.
According to the National Capital Region Police Office, its intelligence officers were approaching the suspects’ vehicle when they were fired upon, prompting the officers to shoot back.
The case against the younger Jaworski was raffled off to Judge Benjamin Pozon of Makati Regional Trial Court Branch 139.