‘Assailants’ among Maguindanao massacre dead, defense lawyer surmises

If defense lawyer Paris Real is to be believed, some of the more than 50 victims in the grisly Maguindanao massacre were killed by their fellow victims. He said it is also possible that some of the victims were, after all, “assailants." “It is possible that some of the cadavers were assailants because the witness admitted he did not know whether the victims used guns," Real said, referring to Dr. Reynaldo Romero, who testified on Wednesday’s hearing on the massacre at the Quezon City Hall of Justice. Romero is a medico-legal expert from the National Bureau of Investigation who autopsied 10 of the 57 victims. Real said the fact that victim Bienvenido Lagarte had bullet entry wounds on the front and back of his body showed that he was surrounded by assailants. He said Lagarte could’ve been accidentally killed by some victims who shot back at their attackers. He also noted that Romero, by his own admission, was neither present when the victims’ bodies were being exhumed, nor did he ever visit the crime site. “He was not there, so he could not even tell whether the assailants were male, female, or a mix of both." The victims were in a convoy on their way to Shariff Aguak on Nov. 23, 2009 to file the candidacy papers of then Buluan vice mayor Esmael “Toto" Mangudadatu when killed by armed men allegedly working for the Ampatuan clan. Mangudadatu, now Maguindanao governor, lost his wife and two sisters in the massacre. Impossible Mangudadatu’s counsel Nena Santos, meanwhile, said Real’s insinuations were impossible, pointing out that the victims were frisked at a checkpoint before the killings and could not have been carrying guns. “Doon pa lang sa Sitio Malating checkpoint, kinuha na lahat pati ang camera, bag, pati lahat. Anong meron sila? Wala nang naiwan sa kanila (All their valuables, including cameras and bags, were confiscated from them at the checkpoint)," Santos said. Santos insisted that none of the members of the convoy was armed, stressing that the group was made up mostly of women. She also noted that chance motorists trailing the convoy who were likewise killed could not have possibly been carrying any firearm because they were on their way to a hospital. Santos maintained that the 57 recovered bodies were all victims, adding that the defense lawyers seemed to be running out of arguments and were merely throwing in whatever wild theory they have during the cross examination of witnesses. Last month, the prosecution and relatives of the victims expressed outrage over an insinuation made by another defense lawyer, Andres Manuel, that the victims might have died not from gunshot wounds but from illnesses. Expertise Also on Wednesday, defense lawyers pointed out in court that Romero has no background in toxicology and ballistics examination, which they said are needed in examining bodies of murder victims. Romero’s admission that he has no background on toxicology came about after Real asked him if he was aware whether the victims could have been poisoned by their assailants even before they were shot. Romero answered in the negative, but quickly added: “But there is no medical evidence to show they were poisoned." Santos downplayed the defense’s attempts at destroying Romero’s credibility as a medical expert. To establish his expertise, Romero had earlier told Judge Jocelyn Solis-Reyes that he had already appeared in around 250 trials as an expert witness. - KBK, GMA News