(Eagle News) — The police on Friday, Aug. 17, said the three lawyers they arrested for “intimidation” and “obstruction of justice” harassed them while they were conducting an inspection at the Time in Manila bar in Makati on Thursday, Aug. 17.
According to Southern Police District director Tomas Apolinario, Leni Rocel Rocha, Jan Vincent Sambrano, and Romulo Bernard Alarkon, based on a report from Senior Inspector Jeson Vigilla of the Station Drug Enforcement Unit, “threatened” the rookie policemen, and “binastos ang mga pulis natin.”
“While the orderly search is ongoing, the three personalities who claimed to be lawyers of one of the business owners of the bar entered the premises of the bar, took several picture and videos of the scene, intimidated the members of the searching team without proper and prior coordination,” the police said.
The police said they also tried to prevent the police from checking the third floor of the establishment.
“Pakiramdam na ng pulis ay pressured na sila sa ginagawang search,” the SPD said.
But Diane Desierto, a partner at the Desierto and Desierto law firm where the lawyers worked, said in a social media post the three did nothing wrong.
“The young lawyers were sent to just monitor the search implementation and inventory-taking as part of standard procedures…They identified themselves as counsels for the owner, and thereafter were told they had no authority there and then publicly handcuffed and arrested to the public,” she said on social media.
She said the lawyers were following standard operating procedure but one of the police team members “thought they were being ‘arrogant’ and immediately arrested them on a charge of ‘obstruction of justice’.”
Prior to the inspection, the bar was raided by police on two separate occasions.
The raids yielded alleged ecstasy tablets, several plastic sachets of alleged cocaine and drug paraphernalia, among others.
Several employees who allegedly supplied illegal drugs to customers were also arrested.
The police said they would file charges against bar owner Rico Blanco and his co-owners Amparo Primero, Reyan Gomintong Ladrillo, Cynthia Primero, Burton Joseph Server III.
Charges will also be filed against the bar manager Danilo Regino.
