Former president Joseph Estrada (right), who is running for mayor in the city of Manila, attends a political rally.
MANILA: The Department of Justice has cleared former President Joseph Estrada in the November 2000 murder of publicist Salvador “Bubby” Dacer and his driver Emmanuel Corbito.
Justice Secretary Leila de Lima disclosed the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) had looked into the alleged involvement of Estrada in the double-murder case. But the investigation proved futile.
“NBI investigators initially pursued the case, but they hit a blank wall,” De Lima said.
De Lima said there was no single piece of evidence found that would warrant a preliminary investigation against the former leader.
In an affidavit submitted to consul generals in New York and California in October 2009, the daughters of Dacer — Carina, Sabina, Emily, and Amparo – insinuated that Estrada was the mastermind in the killing of their father.
In September 2010, they filed with the US District Court in San Francisco a $50m civil suit for compensatory and punitive damages for the cruel, inhuman, degrading treatment, torture, and extrajudicial killing of their father.
Dacer’s daughters sought $10m in principal compensatory damages and $40m in punitive damages.
They named Estrada, Senator Panfilo Lacson, businessman Dante Tan, former Philippine Amusement and Gaming Corporation (Pagcor) president Reynaldo Tenorio and former police officers Michael Ray Aquino, Glenn Dumlao and Vicente Arnado as respondents to the case.
Tenorio headed the government-owned corporation engaged in casino operations during Estrada’s term, while Tan was a key player in the Best World Resources stock manipulation scandal and owner of Best World Gaming and Entertainment Corporation, which was given the sole authority by Pagcor to conduct computerised online bingo gaming nationwide.
Tan fled the Philippines shortly after Estrada was ousted in 2001 and remains at large.
THE PHILIPPINE STAR
