Former president Rodrigo Duterte pulled out the stops in his home turf in Davao City to protect his close friend Apollo Quiboloy by filing complaints against the police — cases that the Davao city prosecutor begged off from handling. If you recall, Quiboloy had successfully evaded arrest for a long five months, until September 8.
Since August 15, the complaints filed by Duterte against Philippine National Police (PNP) chief General Rommel Marbil, Interior Secretary Benhur Abalos, and other cops who enforced the warrant against Quiboloy have been handled by the main office of the Department of Justice (DOJ) in Manila.
“The request for inhibition of City Prosecutor Jhopee Avanceña…is hereby approved, considering there is a clear and verifiable basis and justification for the granting of the same,” Justice Secretary Jesus Crispin Remulla said in an order on August 15, where he also assigned a prosecutor from the DOJ main office to handle the cases.
Avanceña was appointed in February 2022 by Duterte to be the chief city prosecutor of Davao City. Before that, Avanceña was head of Malacañang’s Internal House Affairs also under Duterte.
The former president and ex-Davao mayor filed on July 20 complaints of malicious mischief, violation of domicile, grave misconduct, and grave abuse of authority against Marbil and Abalos as the police began to intensify their manhunt for Quiboloy, who by then had already been ordered arrested by two courts — for the non-bailable human trafficking case, and for the bailable sexual abuse against minors case.
According to the interior department, they have not been notified of any resolution of Duterte’s complaint. “Maraming demandang pinagdaanan ang team na ito, ito lang masasabi ko, for one, ang lessons dito, tiwala, malaki tiwala ko sa pulis, hindi naman…lahat alam ko sa operation, pero ako go lang ako nang go,” Abalos said on September 9, the day after Quiboloy was taken into custody.
(This team was sued many times but one thing I can say is the lesson learned here is trust — I have huge trust of the police, I don’t know everything about the operation, but I supported them all the way.)
Duterte filed these complaints as the appointed administrator of all the properties of Kingdom of Jesus Christ (KOJC), a church group founded by Quiboloy who claims to be the appointed Son of God and who, according to complaints, lured girls and women to have sex with him lest they be subjected to “eternal damnation.”
The KOJC made this appointment as early as March 1, or on the day that a judge in California unsealed the two-year-old US warrants against Quiboloy for sexual trafficking, which, in some cases, was followed by an extradition. The US, to this day, has not requested Quiboloy’s extradition.
Duterte’s appointment as administrator authorized him to “prevent hostile takeovers of Kingdom properties in order to subvert their use for purposes other than Kingdom purposes.” It authorized him precisely to “take any and all lawful ways and means for the recovery or protection of the Kingdom properties,” said the appointment document.
Duterte’s complaint referred specifically to the June 10 operation of the police, or the first attempt to implement the arrest warrants. It was a tense operation that saw police officers in anti-riot gear and police shields as they tried to enter the sprawling compound, where Quiboloy hid all along, according to Davao Region Police Chief Nicolas Torre III.
“Although the PNP-SAF-CIDG [PNP-Special Action Force-Criminal Investigation and Detection Group] troops did not possess a search warrant, I had to intervene before any further damage could be done,” Duterte said in his complaint-affidavit, saying that KOJC administrators called him 4:46 am on June 10 to tell him “the compound was being [sic] under siege.”
“As to the second element of Rule 113, Section 11 of the Rules of Court, they did not seek my permission as the KOJC Property Administrator to enter into the property,” Duterte said, citing the rules requiring arresting officers to announce “his authority and purpose” before breaking into premises.
According to his affidavit, Duterte was also called by the cops enforcing the warrants, saying that “even during our phone conversation, they did not ask for my permission to enter the property.”
Aside from Duterte’s complaint, other KOJC officials had filed a petition before the Supreme Court on September 2, seeking to stop the police from the raids and searches. Quiboloy was arrested on September 8, after negotiations that saw come of his conditions met.
A Sarangani prosecutor earlier dismissed another set of grave coercion, unjust vexation and violation of domicile complaints filed by a local resident against the police for an operation in the afternoon of June 10 when armed men allegedly questioned them, looking for Quiboloy.
– Rappler.com