Judge inhibits herself from actor’s illegal drug cases

Actor Mark Anthony Fernandez is detained for possessing a kilogram of marijuana. TONETTE OREJAS

CITY OF SAN FERNANDO — A judge inhibited herself from hearing the two cases filed against actor Mark Anthony Fernandez, who was arrested with a kilogram of dried marijuana in his car after he ignored a police checkpoint in Angeles City on Oct. 3.

Judge Eda Era of the Regional Trial Court Branch (RTC) 60 has backed out from the cases because her husband belongs to the Guardians Brotherhood of which Fernandez is also a member. The cases have been re-raffled to Judge Meredith Malig of RTC Branch 58.

A third case against Fernandez for resisting an arrest is being heard by Judge Ireneo Pangilinan of the Municipal Trial Court Branch 1.

Fernandez pleaded innocent to charges that he violated Section 5 of Republic Act No. 9165 (the Comprehensive Dangerous Drugs Act of 2002), involving the sale, trade, administration, dispensation, delivery, distribution and transportation of controlled and regulated substances.

Era earlier dismissed the complaint filed by the Angeles police which accused Fernandez of possessing drug paraphernalia after the marijuana grinder allegedly recovered from him was not in the inventory of items found in the actor’s car. Police filed a motion for reconsideration.

Era also resolved a motion by Fernandez’s lawyer, Sylvia Flores, to transfer the actor to the Pampanga provincial jail where he has been detained since Oct. 11.

Fernandez was first held at the Angeles City police’s Station 6, then spent three days at the Bureau of Jail Management and Penology facility inside Camp Tomas Pepito, also in Angeles.

At the provincial jail, he is detained in Cell No. 4 at the ground floor of Presidio, a newly refurbished century-old prison. About 70 percent of the inmates are in a new building.

Fernandez shares a 6 by 6-square meter jail with three other inmates who are accused of peddling illegal drugs. The provincial jail has 1,751 detainees, 70 percent of them facing drug cases. — TONETTE OREJAS