Accuser seeks lifestyle check on Lagman

THE OMBUDSMAN has been asked to conduct a “lifestyle check” on Albay Representative-elect Edcel Lagman over various properties he had allegedly acquired with his pork barrel during his previous congressional term.

The complainant, Hernando Bruce, made the request as he amended to plunder, a non-bailable offense, the graft complaint he had filed against Lagman last April over the alleged misuse of his Priority Development Assistance Fund (PDAF).

Bruce alleged that Lagman and his daughter, Tabaco Mayor-elect Krisel Lagman-Luistro, “accumulated more than P240 million” based on a Commission on Audit report on Lagman’s PDAF or pork barrel during his term as Albay first district representative in 2007-2010.

Bruce, who is related to Lagman’s wife, identified various properties in Albay and Metro Manila as being allegedly owned by Lagman through “dummies.”

“I am requesting an immediate lifestyle check involving the following properties since I have discovered that (Lagman and his daughter) acquired several properties obviously funded with his PDAF,” Bruce said in the amended complaint he filed in the Office of the Ombudsman on Tuesday.

He said the properties were in the names of Lagman’s “close relatives and friends” who were his “dummies.”

The properties in Albay, he claimed, were the Patio de San Jose hotel in Malilipot, a gravel and sand factory in Sto. Domingo, and a heavy equipment garage and mansion on 10 hectares in Bacacay.

But Lagman dismissed the plunder case filed by Bruce as a “nuisance case” meant to embarrass him.

In a phone interview, Lagman said Bruce was being used by a candidate who accused him of the same lies during the recent elections.

“The candidate behind Bruce is a sore loser, a malevolent individual. This case is politically motivated,” he said.

Lagman said the funds the COA referred to were not from his pork barrel but were allocated to congressional leaders and committee chairs.

He said they were legitimate funds allocated in the national budget and allowed for use outside a representative’s district.