DoJ team affirms homicide case vs Daza son-in-law

MANILA, Philippines —The Department of Justice concluded its reinvestigation of the killing of business executive Noel Orate Sr. by affirming on Wednesday the homicide case filed last month by the Quezon City police against Bulacan provincial board member Romeo Allan Robes.

“[E]vidence extant in the records is sufficient to engender a well-founded belief that only homicide was committed. It is respectfully recommended that the information for homicide against respondent Robes be affirmed on reinvestigation,” assistant state prosecutor Gino Paolo Santiago said in a 10-page resolution, which was approved by Prosecutor General Claro Arellano.

The Quezon City Regional Trial Court Branch 18 earlier ordered the reinvestigation upon a motion filed by  Orate’s family. Orate died of multiple gunshot wounds on the night of February 10 at the residence of former congresswoman Nanette Castelo Daza.

Robes, Daza’s son-in-law claimed he shot Orate in self defense after the latter allegedly held hostage Daza’s kin and househelp. But the Orates insisted that the victim’s death was premeditated.

Daza and Orate, whose marriages to different partners had been annulled, had a 12-year relationship.

On March 1, Justice Secretary Leila de Lima ordered the National Bureau of Investigation to conduct a new probe of the fatal shooting. The agency recommended on March 30 that a murder case be filed against Robes.

The records of the Quezon City prosecutor’s office and the NBI report were later transmitted to Santiago, who concluded his reinvestigation on March 27.

In conducting and resolving the court-ordered reinvestigation, Santiago said he limited his inquiry to a single issue: whether there was sufficient ground to engender a well-founded belief that circumstances existed to qualify the killing of Orate as murder.

The prosecutor said that after a “meticulous review” he was “morally convinced” that only homicide was committed.

Santiago said not all qualifying circumstances specified under the Revised Penal Code were present for the killing to be construed as murder. He pointed out that no evidence was presented to show how the killing commenced, developed and ended, as the testimony of the Orate family and the police only narrated events after the killing.

“There is nothing in the report that would establish that the perpetrator consciously adopted a mode of attack to facilitate the perpetration of the killing without risk to himself, which is the essence of treachery, whereas there is a witness testifying that the victim was armed at the time of the incident, and narrating circumstances that support self-defense,” he said.

The fact the Orate was shot five times did not necessarily mean he was murdered, Santiago added, saying, “Jurisprudence states that when the assault is continuous, the fact that the final blows were inflicted in a manner consistent with treachery does not qualify the killing to murder unless proven that treachery was also present at the inception of the attack.”

The fact that Orate never drew his gun also did little in proving treachery.

“Treachery cannot be established from the circumstances as treachery cannot be presumed; it must be proved by clear and convincing evidence as clearly as the killing itself,” Santiago said.

The elements of “evident premeditation” could not be inferred from the evidence in the records, he added, pointing out that “there was no evidence showing that time when the respondent determined to commit the crime, an act manifestly indicating that the offender had clung to his determination, and a sufficient lapse of time between the determination and the execution thereto to allow the respondent to reflect on the consequences of his act.”

The prosecutor said there was also no evidence to show that Robes purposely employed or took advantage of superior strength in killing Orate.

The Orates can still file a motion for reconsideration or elevate the matter to De Lima’s office for a review.