Suspect in enforcer’s beating ducks jail transfer for 3rd time

Controversial businessman Arnold Padilla has yet to see the inside of a police prison more than 10 days after his arrest, as his blood pressure shot up again on Tuesday just as lawmen were about to transfer him from the Philippine National Police General Hospital to Camp Bagong Diwa in Taguig City.

Director Guillermo Eleazar, National Capital Region Police Office (NCRPO) chief, told the Inquirer that Padilla still ended up at Camp Bagong Diwa although he was being kept in the office of the NCRPO-Regional Special Operations Unit.

Medical personnel from the NCRPO were monitoring his condition and he would not be detained until his condition has normalized, Eleazar said.

Above normal

Padilla, who was arrested for illegal possession of firearms and explosives on August 24, was discharged from the PNP hospital at 12:15 a.m. on Tuesday with a blood pressure of 150/100.

It was the third time that a sudden rise in his blood pressure had prevented him from being detained, the first being on the day of his arrest, prompting his transfer to St. Luke’s Medical Center in Taguig City. It happened again when he was discharged from St. Luke’s on Sunday, leading to his transfer to Camp Crame hospital.

“He still hasn’t gotten a taste of detention,” said Eleazar, who lamented that when Padilla was still at St. Luke’s, it was a team of seven lawyers, and not doctors, that updated him on the businessman’s condition.

Asked whether he thought the suspect’s ailments were a ruse, Eleazar said that Padilla’s blood pressure was really high although the businessman seemed unconcerned.

“The way we see it, he really doesn’t want to transfer so he’ll find a way,” Eleazar said. During his time at St. Luke’s, Padilla allegedly refused to take his medicine to lower his blood pressure. A doctor also tried to delay his discharge, saying he needed to be checked because he was suffering from sleep apnea.

Nothing unusual in tests

The suspect underwent a blood test on Monday and an angiogram the week before and both came back clear, according to Eleazar.

It wasn’t proper for Padilla to “continue enjoying hospital stay,” he added.

The businessman, no stranger to ruffling feathers, first gained notoriety in a viral video that showed him, his live-in partner and bodyguards verbally and physically abusing traffic enforcers who had flagged them down for running a red light last month.

An unrelated raid on August 24 on his house in the exclusive Magallanes Village produced two grenades, a .45-caliber Glock 21 pistol and a Kel-Tec 12 gauge automatic shotgun. Padilla had accused the police of planting the grenades.

Both he and his bodyguard, Alfie Ortiz, were charged in the Makati City Prosecutor’s Office for illegal possession of firearms and explosives.