Court allows Andal Sr. to undergo full medical checkup

A Quezon City court on Friday allowed Maguindanao massacre suspect Andal Ampatuan Sr. to undergo a full medical checkup to determine the cause of his swollen ankle. In a two-page order, Judge Jocelyn Solis-Reyes of the Quezon City (QC) Regional Trial Court Branch 22 granted the motion of the former Autonomous Region for Muslim Mindanao (ARMM) governor. However, Reyes said Andal Sr. must be examined by a physician from the Department of Internal Medicine Section of Rheumatology of the Philippine General Hospital or from the Armed Forces Medical Center inside the Metro Manila District Jail-QC Jail Annex in Camp Bagong Diwa in Bicutan. The QC judge made the decision upon the recommendation of Dr. Victoria Estrada-Valeria, health services chief of the Bureau of Jail Management and Penology (BJMP), who said Andal Sr. should be referred to Dr. Glenn Santos, his attending physician at the Makati Medical Center (MMC). But the court opted to refer Andal Sr. to a government physician after it found out that Santos was not an attending physician at the MMC as shown by a recent certification issued by Dr. Florencio Gerardo Caldo, Jr., assistant director of the hospital's medical services division. Andal Sr.'s camp earlier asked Reyes to allow the accused to be examined at a tertiary government hospital due to his aching leg, which he said might be traced to his prostate ailment. Dr. Valeria diagnosed Andal Sr. to have been suffering from osteoarthritis in his left ankle joint. Prosecutors, for their part, claimed that the Ampatuan patriarch was using his health condition to delay his arraignment. Reyes, however, explained that with Andal Sr.'s apparent illness, the court found it was necessary to grant his request. But Reyes has ordered the physician who will examine the former governor to immediately submit to the court the result of the examination. Andal Sr.'s legal counsel Sigfrid Fortun, meanwhile, asked the court to schedule the arraignment of his client on May 25. He also asked the court to allow a Maguindanaoan-speaking interpreter to assist him during the arraignment. Andal Sr. and 11 other prominent members of the Ampatuan clan, including his three sons Andal Jr., Zaldy, and Sajid, are among 196 people charged with 57 counts of murder in connection with the massacre of 57 people in Ampatuan town on Nov. 23, 2009. — with Kimberly Jane Tan/LBG, GMA News