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Mangudadatu: Vizconde's fate won't befall massacre case


Because of the testimonies of eyewitnesses, last year’s massacre of 57 people in Maguindanao province will not suffer the same fate of the Vizconde massacre case, a relative of one of the victims in the 2009 carnage said on Wednesday. Maguindanao Gov. Esmael “Toto" Mangudadatu, who lost his wife and two sisters in the Maguindanao massacre, said unlike the Vizconde case, his camp has witnesses who admitted being in the area when the killings took place on a hilly portion of Ampatuan town. “Itong witnesses natin ay eyewitnesses at kasama mismo iyong iba sa masaker. Itong kay Vizconde, with all due respect kay Alfaro, hindi naman niya nakita (What we have in our case are eyewitnesses. In the Vizconde case, with all due respect to Alfaro, she didn’t witness the crime)," Mangudadatu said. Mangudadatu was referring to Jessica Alfaro, the prosecution’s “star witness" during the Vizconde case trials. Her testimony led to the conviction of seven suspects, including Hubert Webb, son of former senator Freddie Webb. “Mahirap din na ganun ito ang pag-profile ng insidente na hindi mo nakita. In short, kasinungalingan (It’s hard to make a profile of an incident that you didn’t really see. In short, that’s tantamount to lying)," Mangudadatu said. The Maguindanao governor made the statement a day after the Supreme Court acquitted Webb and six other co-accused, citing, among others, the flawed testimony of Alfaro. The court also acknowledged the defense’s argument that Alfaro was an undercover agent of the National Bureau of Investigation and not a witness. Three people — Estrelita Vizconde and daughters Carmela and Jennifer — were killed in the Vizconde case, which took place June 30, 1991, inside their Parañaque home. Their patriarch, Lauro, was in the United States for a business trip that time. Strong evidence Mangudadatu said he believes they have strong evidence against the suspects in the Maguindanao massacre case, which include members of the powerful Ampatuan clan. “I don't believe I will suffer the same fate as Lauro does. Our evidence is strong," he said. Of the witnesses so far presented by the prosecution in the Maguindanao massacre trial, three — Norodin Mauyag, Ampatuan vice mayor Rasul Sangki, and PO1 Rainer Ebus — had told a Quezon City court that they saw the actual killings. At least 57 people, 32 of them journalists, were mercilessly gunned down on Nov. 23, 2009, by armed men allegedly upon orders from Andal Ampatuan Jr., scion of the Ampatuan clan and then mayor of Datu Unsay town. Some members of the Ampatuan family, including its patriarch Andal Ampatuan Sr., are currently detained for the crime. — KBK/LBG, GMANews.TV

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