DOJ: Bar blast suspect to face frustrated murder raps

UPDATED 3:40 p.m. - The Department of Justice (DOJ) has recommended the filing of multiple frustrated murder charges against the suspect in the September 2010 Bar exam blast where more than 40 people were injured. In a resolution released on Wednesday, the DOJ found probable cause to file raps against suspect Anthony Leal Nepomuceno for failing to prove that he was not the person who lobbed the grenade which caused the blast. The resolution stemmed from a complaint filed before the DOJ by 10 law students who were injured due to the blast, including San Sebastian College’s Raissa Laurel who lost her legs after the incident. The explosion, which left more than 40 people, happened in front of the campus of De La Salle University (DLSU) in Manila on the last Sunday of the four-weekend Bar exams last year. The DOJ said the suspect presented “weak" evidence to support his claim that he was not present along Taft Avenue in Manila at the time of the explosion. The resolution likewise ruled that statements presented by Nepomuceno to prove that he was not at the crime scene were just “self-serving," since the accounts came from the suspect’s family members, friends and fraternity brothers. “Respondent [Nepomuceno] mainly relied on denial and alibi, stating that he did not commit the crime and he was not present at the place of the crime when the crime was committed," the DOJ resolution read. The department added that the positive identification of four eyewitnesses, who pointed to Nepumoceno as the person who threw the explosive during the incident, “prevailed" over the suspect’s denials. “The interconnection between the statements given by the witnesses is enough to engender a well-founded belief that the person who lobbed the hand grenade, which exploded that day, is the respondent [Nepomuceno]," the resolution stated. The DOJ used the findings the National Bureau of Investigation in the National Capital Region, as well as its own probe on the incident, to establish probable cause to file a case against the suspect. The resolution, approved by Senior Deputy State Prosecutor Richard Fadullon, also recommended the filing of illegal possession of explosive charges against Nepomuceno. - VVP, GMA News