A Cebu judge ordered the the arrest of a forensic expert of the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) for delaying the release of records for the identification of bodies in the 2008 sinking of the Princess of the Stars.
Regional Trial Court Judge Soliver Peras of Branch 10 cited Dr. Renato Bautista in contempt of court and issued the warrant of arrest last Oct. 7.
A copy of the arrest order was received by the NBI headquarters yesterday.
Bautista was head of the NBI-Disaster Victims Identification (NBI-DVI) team.
He was cited for delaying the release to the Public Attorney’s Office (PAO) of documents regarding the post-mortem tests made on the cadavers of the sunken ship.
“You are hereby commanded to arrest Dr. Renato Bautista who has been charged before me with the offense of contempt and deliver him to the nearest police station or jail,” said the judge in the warrant.
NBI Director Magtanggol Gatdula was given 10 days to serve the arrest warrant.
Bautista was ordered detained until he complies with the court order to release the documents needed by the PAO.
In a phone interview, PAO chief Persida Acosta said they went to the NBI Office in Manila last Sept. 1 to get the documents from the NBI but the papers were not turned over to them.
“The families and relatives of the victims considered it suppression of evidence,” Acosta said.
She said they needed the documents so that their own forensic experts could start identifying cadavers recovered from the sunken ship.
“It seems that Bautista is now hiding,” she said.
But Bautista denied that he was withholding the documents.
In a phone interview, Bautista said he was willing to give the documents to the PAO although the victims’ data remain “confidential” as agreed upon by the NBI and Interpol, an agency that helped local authorities in identifying the cadavers.
“I’m willing to turn it over. I’m willing to have it released. That’s the court order. I can’t do otherwise,” he said.
He said he was on sick leave and wasn’t able to meet with the PAO team last Sept. 1.
He, however, said that he instructed his staff to allow the PAO to photocopy the documents.
He said PAO chief Acosta and the other lawyers decided to just come back after seeing the “voluminous” documents.
“They (PAO) didn’t come back,” Bautista said.
He admitted having apprehensions about releasing the documents due to the agreement of the NBI and the Interpol.
He said he explained his predicament to Gatdula, who told him not to mind the Interpol and instead follow the court order.
Bautista said he wasn’t aware about the court order holding him liable of contempt.
Last Sept. 1, the PAO along with sheriff Fortunato Viovicente went to the NBI office in Manila to enforce the court order that mandated the NBI to turnover to the PAO of documents they needed.
However, Bautista was not around.
“There was no explanation submitted by Dr. Bautista before this court why he was not present during that day while in fact he was duly notified of the proceedings during the hearing on Aug. 11, 2001,” Judge Peras said.
The judge said the non-appearance of Bautista was “another move to delay the transfer of records, documents, objects, and evidence to the PAO.”
PAO has been seeking the transfer of the documents from the NBI to help identify the human remains that will undergo an anthropological examination by a University of the Philippines (UP)-based forensics group.
Erwin Erfe, PAO physician-lawyer and forensic consultant, will be using skeletal remains of the cadavers and other basis to identify them.
He said DNA identification should not have been used as a “first-line” and primary method of identification since it is the least effective method in mass disasters.
He said 98 percent of the victims of the 2004 tsunami that hit Thailand were identified using dental examination, fingerprints and physical evidence.
For several months after the sinking, experts from the NBI and Interpol had been using DNA testing of human tissue or bone.
Around 560 cadavers have been recovered from the sunken ship.
Of the number, 111 remains unidentified.
The MV Princess of the Stars capsized off Romblon at the height of Typhoon Frank while en route to Cebu City on June 21, 2008.
Of 820 people on board, only 32 survived.