Bid to arrest Trillanes not over with RTC ruling —DOJ

Senator Antonio Trillanes IV's amnesty case is "far from over," Justice Secretary Menardo Guevarra said after the government was dealt defeat by one of the Makati courts it asked to send the staunch Duterte critic back to jail.

"I'd like to inform everyone that this is not the end of it," the Justice chief said at a  hastily called press conference Monday afternoon. "To some extent, both parties were successful."

He said the DOJ won on the matter of the constitutionality of Proclamation No. 572, the presidential directive that revoked Trillanes' amnesty, while the senator secured a victory in terms of the trial court judge's factual findings, which contradicted the government position when it ruled that he applied for amnesty and made an admission of guilt.

"So we expect that both parties... may elevate this ruling of the RTC to a superior court," Guevarra said, referring to either the Supreme Court or the Court of Appeals.

"This is not the end of it. Nobody can claim that he or it has actually come out as the victor in these proceedings. Remember that this is only one incident of a major case that is pending before the Supreme Court," he told reporters.

Judge Andres Soriano of the Makati Regional Trial Court Branch 148 junked a DOJ motion seeking Trillanes' arrest for a dismissed case of coup d'etat.

In ruling so, Soriano recognized the "final and executory" dismissal of the coup case in 2011, after the senator was amnestied, and refused to disturb the doctrine of immutability of a final judgment.

This ruling clashes with an earlier order by Judge Elmo Alameda of the court next-door, Branch 150, directing Trillanes' arrest for a similarly dismissed rebellion case, over the same set of facts. Trillanes is now out on bail.

The senator's petition for certiorari and prohibition is pending before the High Court, which has already denied him a temporary restraining order against the implementation of Proclamation No. 572.

However, the SC referred the resolution of the factual issues of the case -- whether or not Trillanes applied for amnesty and admitted his guilt over the 2003 Oakwood Mutiny and the 2007 Manila Peninsula Siege -- to the trial courts.

Guevarra said he will discuss the DOJ's next move with the panel of prosecutors assigned to the case. —NB, GMA News