CITY OF SAN FERNANDO – Detained property developer Delfin Lee’s chief legal counsel said yesterday he felt harassed by the charges of obstruction of justice filed against him and another colleague by tha Criminal Investigation and Detection Group (CIDG) chief over their client’s syndicated estafa case.
“There was absolutely no fabrication of facts at all when I told the police about the Court of Appeals (CA) decision quashing the warrant of arrest against Lee,” lawyer Willie Rivera told Punto! Monday.
Rivera said he felt harassed by the case stemming from his being legal counsel to Lee who has remained at the provincial jail here for syndicated estafa allegedly involving some P6.6 billion funds used for his Xevera housing projects in Bacolor and Mabalacat in Pampanga.
Rivera and lawyer Gilbert Repizo, also a lawyer for Lee, were named respondents in the case allegedly violating Presidential Decree No. 1829 “penalizing obstruction of apprehension and prosecution of criminal offenders.”
In her subpoena for preliminary investigation of the case sent to Rivera and co-respondent Repizo, Quezon City assistant prosecutor Diovie Macaraig-Calderon said “no motion to dismiss (their case) will be entertained” and that “only counter affi davits will be admitted.”
The case was filed by CIDG Director Benjamin Magalong who accused Rivera and Repizo of “giving false or fabricated information to mislead or prevent the law enforcement agencies from apprehending the offender (Lee)…”
Rivera stressed that the CA special fifteenth division, in a decision dated Nov. 7, 2013, had indeed issued an order quashing the warrant of arrest issued against Lee by the Pampanga Regional Trial Court, Branch 42 in relation to the syndicated estafa case.
“I did not fabricate that. I just told them (police) about that decision. And then, based on that decision, I asked that my client be delisted from the list of those up for arrest. It was their decision to delist him and I thought this was because they respected the hierarchy of the courts,” he said.
The police’s Task Force Tugis arrested Lee last March 6, despite the CA decision, prompting Lee’s lawyers to produce two letters, including one from PNP Director General Alan Purisima and another by Magalong himself declaring that Lee had been “delisted.”
Rivera also insisted that the CA order quashing the RTC’s arrest warrant against Lee was executory, contrary to Magalong’s claim he was deceived into thinking this was the case. The police later said that the delisting of Lee merely applied to the revocation of any reward offered for his arrest.
