Trillanes Returns to Senate After Posting Bail

Senator Antonio Trillanes IV on Tuesday returned to the Senate after posting a PHP200,000 bail in connection with the arrest warrant earlier issued by a Makati court over his participation in the 2007 Manila Peninsula siege.

In an interview, Trillanes said he is not yet ready to go home “unless this issue has been formally settled.”

The Makati Regional Trial Court (RTC) Branch 150 issued the arrest warrant three weeks after President Rodrigo Duterte voided the 2011 amnesty granted to Trillanes over the senator’s alleged failure to comply with the “minimum requirements to qualify under the amnesty proclamation.”

The court also banned Trillanes from leaving the country without its permission.

The arrest warrant stemmed from the urgent ex-parte motion filed by the Department of Justice (DOJ), asking the trial court to issue a hold departure order and an alias warrant of arrest.

This, after Duterte issued Proclamation No. 572 declaring as void ab initio (from the beginning) the amnesty issued to Trillanes for his failure to comply with basic requirements for the grant of his amnesty.

The DOJ said with the amnesty declared as void from the start, the dismissal of the case is also void.

After learning of the arrest warrant, Trillanes voluntarily went with the police officers, led by National Capital Region Police Office Director Guillermo Eleazar, a few minutes past 3 p.m., leaving the Senate for the first time since the voiding of his amnesty was made public in September 4.

Meanwhile, Trillanes said they are now waiting for a “miracle” from Makati RTC Branch 148, which would decide on the order of arrest asked for by the DOJ in relation with the coup d’etat case against the senator.

“We are slightly more hopeful, but we have to prepare for the worse,” Trillanes said.

Coup d’etat is a non-bailable offense and the DOJ’s motion is still pending in the said court.

Proclamation No. 572, which was signed by President Duterte on Aug. 31, 2018, stated that as a consequence of the voiding of Trillanes’ amnesty, the DOJ and Court Martial of the Armed Forces of the Philippines are ordered to pursue all criminal administrative cases filed against the former Navy officer in relation to the Oakwood Mutiny and the Manila Peninsula Incident.

In the proclamation, Duterte also ordered the military and the police “to employ all lawful means to apprehend” Trillanes “so that he can be recommitted to the detention facility where he had been incarcerated for him to stand trial for the crimes he is charged with.” (PNA)