MANILA— The Supreme Court has junked the Office of the Solicitor General’s petition challenging the plea bargaining agreement between the Ombudsman's Office of the Special Prosecutor and retired Maj. Gen. Carlos Garcia who was accused of plunder.

In a decision dated Sept. 16, 2020 but posted on the SC website only on Wednesday, the High Court Third Division upheld the Sandiganbayan’s ruling approving the agreement saying there was no grave abuse of discretion on the part of the anti-graft tribunal when it approved the deal and rejected the OSG’s attempt to intervene.

The high court also lifted the 2013 temporary restraining order on the Sandiganbayan’s grant of Garcia’s request for bail.

The plunder charge against Garcia was filed in April 2005 and stemmed from the seizure in the US of $100,000 of undeclared cash from his sons Juan Paolo and Ian Carl.

Their mother Clarita claimed that the funds were sourced from Garcia's salary as military comptroller and a two-star Philippine general.

Garcia also faced a money laundering charge, later consolidated with the plunder case.

In March 2010, the Office of the Special Prosecutor entered into a plea bargaining agreement with Garcia, approved by then Ombudsman Merceditas Gutierrez.

Under the agreement, Garcia withdrew his not guilty plea to the plunder charge in exchange for a guilty plea to the lesser crime of indirect bribery, which he did in December 2010.

Garcia was to cede P135 million worth of cash, real and personal property in favor of the government, which he later executed.

The Sandiganbayan, in December 2010, also approved Garcia’s request for bail at P30,000 for each case or a total of P60,000.

• Ex-Gen. Garcia walks free

But the OSG, in January 2011, under Solicitor General Jose Anselmo Cadiz questioned the plea bargaining agreement before the Sandiganbayan saying the republic did not consent to the deal and that it was lopsided.

Garcia was accused of plundering P300 million while the plea bargain deal only recovered P135 million from him.

But the Sandiganbayan rejected the OSG's motion to intervene saying it was the Ombudsman who properly represented the state and that it was only in cases of recovery of ill-gotten wealth of former dictator Ferdinand Marcos that the Office of the Solicitor General could represent the Republic of the Philippines.

The Special Prosecutor, under the Ombudsman Act of 1988, had the power to enter into plea bargaining agreements, the anti-graft court added.

It also rejected the OSG's motion-in-intervention and granted the plea bargaining agreement.

The OSG, headed by then Solicitor Genenral Francis Jardeleza in 2013, was forced to go to the Supreme Court to challenge the Sandiganbayan ruling.

• SC Justice Martires denies writing plea deal grant for ex-AFP comptroller Garcia

FROM THE ARCHIVES

Watch more in iWantv or TFC.tv

THE RULING

The SC Third Division, through ponente Associate Justice Marvic Leonen, said the OSG overstepped its bounds by insisting on additional representation when the state was already represented by the Ombudsman.

“The Office of the Solicitor General's authority to represent the Government is not plenary or all-encompassing. Book IV, Title III, Chapter 12, Section 35(11) of the Administrative Code does not give it carte blanche authority to swoop in at any time and in any circumstance simply because it believes that the people's welfare and the ends of justice require its intervention, especially if the government is already represented by the appropriate agency,” the Court said.

It added that allowing the OSG to intervene would have meant giving it the power of supervision and control over the Ombudsman, an independent constitutional body.

“To allow the Office of the Solicitor General to cherry-pick its jurisdiction under the pretext that it believes its intervention is warranted by the greater good and the ends of justice, would be to impliedly give it supervisory powers or even control over other agencies with a similar mandate of representing the government in different courts and fora," the court said.

"This cannot be allowed, as the Office of the Solicitor General's broad mandate under the Administrative Code to represent the Government does not involve the power of control or even supervision over other agencies which also represent the government,” it said.

Associate Justices Rosmari Carandang, Rodil Zalameda, Mario Lopez and Samuel Gaerlan concurred in Leonen’s ponencia.

The SC also said it would not interfere with the substance of or the wisdom behind the plea bargaining agreement as it is within the Ombudsman's mandate.

“The acceptance of a plea bargain is purely upon the discretion of the prosecutor, while the approval of the plea bargain is subject to the judicial discretion of the court trying the facts. Hence, any review of a plea bargain approved by the Office of the Ombudsman would be tantamount to an appeal on a question of fact and not the proper subject of a petition for certiorari,” it explained.

In a petition for certiorari, SC reviews the exercise of judicial or quasi-judicial functions by a tribunal, board or officer on the ground of grave abuse of discretion amounting to lack or excess of jurisdiction.

But the Court said there was no such abuse.

It ruled that the prosecution failed to prove that the gifts received by Garcia amounted to more than P50 million, the threshold for plunder.

The prosecution, the SC said, did not present a military contractor or supplier who could provide concrete and supporting details to the admissions of Garcia’s wife, Clarita.

And neither did former Commission on Audit commissioner Heidi Mendoza’s testimony prove that the missing funds of the Armed Forces of the Philippines could be attributed to Garcia’s supposed misuse of funds.

“Considering the prosecution's failure to prove private respondent Garcia's guilt for plunder and money laundering beyond reasonable doubt, respondent Sandiganbayan cannot be said to have gravely abused its discretion in approving the assailed Plea Bargaining Agreement,” it concluded.

Garcia is serving time at the New Bilibid Prison.