Public asked not to prejudge Ecleo pending SC ruling

The camp of Dinagat Islands Rep. Ruben Ecleo Jr., who was earlier found guilty for graft, appealed to the public on Monday not to "prejudge" the lawmaker while a motion for a temporary restraining order (TRO) is still pending before the Supreme Court (SC).

In a statement, Ecleo’s camp said he should be given the benefit of the doubt while the high court is still deciding on his “extremely urgent motion" to issue a TRO on the new arrest warrant issued by the Sandiganbayan against him.

"Ecleo may not be everyone’s favorite congressman, but this should not keep us from giving him the benefit of the doubt, more so since very substantial issues relating to the evidence and the basis for convicting him have yet to be resolved by the Supreme Court," the statement read.

The Sandiganbayan first division released to the media last Thursday a resolution ordering Ecleo’s arrest, after the Supreme Court affirmed last November the anti-graft court’s decision convicting him for three counts of graft.

This prompted Ecleo to ask the high court last Friday to block the arrest warrant issued against him by the Sandiganbayan.

In the same statement, the lawmaker’s camp also expressed hopes that the high court will resolve certain issues, such as whether or not Ecleo was accorded due process, before sending him to jail.

"In the balance hangs the liberty of Congressman Ecleo. Issues of whether or not he was accorded due process, whether he was prejudged, or whether or not he really committed graft as charged, should be first resolved before this can be considered final and he is hauled to jail to serve sentence," the lawmaker’s camp said.

Ecleo was convicted for his alleged involvement in anomalous construction deals when he was still mayor of San Jose town in Surigao del Norte from 1991 to 1994.

Ecleo gained national attention when 22 of his followers and a policeman were killed in a firefight in June 2002 at the PBMA compound on Dinagat Island off Surigao del Norte. Unharmed, he surrendered shortly after the incident.

Police and military forces then were trying to arrest him as a suspect in the brutal murder of his wife, Alona Bacolod Ecleo, and her parents. — KBK/RSJ, GMA News