De Lima drug charges 'pure invention' - SC Justice Carpio

Since 2017, then senior Supreme Court Associate Justice Antonio Carpio have made known by his dissent that the opposition senator Leila De Lima should be released from her detention.

Carpio has called the charges against the opposition senator for illegal drug trade as “blatantly a pure invention” this has been fully explained in his 39 page dissenting opinion on the high court's decision not to nullify De Lima's arrest, he even criticized the senator's continued detention, saying the charges against De Lima lacked key elements for drug accusations.

"The accusation of illegal trade of drugs against petitioner is blatantly a pure invention," Carpio said. "This Court, the last bulwark of democracy and liberty in the land, should never countenance such a fake charge," he added.

Opposition Senator Leila De Lima and ex-SC Justice Antonio Carpio

(photo credit to owner)

De Lima has been one if not the fiercest critic of the Duterte administration was arrested last February 2017 over her alleged involvement in the New Bilibid prison drug trade when she was still the Justice Secretary during the Nonoy Aquino III.

Supreme Court voted 9 to 6, which dismissed the petition by senator De Lima asking the high court to void her arrest., citing “lack of merit.”

Justice Carpio, one of the six magistrates who voted to grant the petition to void De Lima’s arrest, said the charges filed against the opposition senator detailed direct bribery, not related to drugs.

"Not a single essential element of this particular offense is alleged in the information (complaint). What the information actually charges is the bailable offense of direct bribery," he said.

He said charges of bribery do not fall against the jurisdiction of the Regional Trial Court that issued the Senator's warrant of arrest, but under the anti-graft court Sandiganbayan.

"To allow the continued detention of the petitioner under this Information is one of the grossest injustices ever perpetrated in recent memory in full view of the Filipino nation and the entire world," Justice Carpio said.

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Report from CNN Phils