No arraignment for De Lima this holiday

Sen. Leila De Lima
(File photo by LYN RILLON / Philippine Daily Inquier)

Sen. Leila de Lima will be celebrating Christmas and New Year holidays still detained and for a longer period of time.

This was after she failed anew to enter her plea before the Muntinlupa court on Friday after Department of Justice (DOJ) prosecutors moved to amend the third of the three drug charges filed against her.

The arraignment of De Lima and her coaccused at the Muntinlupa Regional Trial Court (RTC) Branch 206 was deferred after the prosecution filed a motion to admit the amended information on Thursday.

Judge Patria Manalastas-De Leon still has to notify the parties of the new schedule of their hearings, but De Lima’s camp said it won’t be before the year ends.

The Muntinlupa RTC Branches 204 and 206, where De Lima’s two other drug trading cases are being heard, also rescheduled her arraignment to January 2018.

De Leon ordered the third warrant of arrest against De Lima and her coaccused on Nov. 15.

Just like in Branches 204 and 205, the DOJ filed motions to change the charges against De Lima and the others from drug trading to “conspiracy to commit drug trading.”

Filibon Tacardon, De Lima’s lawyer, said the DOJ’s tactic was “to avoid the fatal defect on their original information, which is the absence of the actual drugs allegedly traded.”

Senior Assistant Prosecutor Ramoncito Ocampo, however, explained that the reason for the amendments was for the charges to be “more precise,” adding that the move did not violate her rights as an accused.

“It will not, in any way, prejudice the rights of the accused. Neither will it alter the theory of the prosecution, which stands in the original information,” he stressed.