Guevarra welcomes review of law on behavior-based sentence reductions

Justice Secretary Menardo Guevarra on Thursday welcomed a sought congressional investigation on the reported impending release of a former mayor sentenced to lengthy prison terms for the 1993 Sarmenta-Gomez rape-slay case. 

"The conduct of a legislative inquiry is most welcome, as the people are reacting to the effects of the law that the Congress itself enacted in 2013," Guevarra said in a message to reporters.

"This may be a good time for the Congress to review its own creation," he added.

Senator Franklin Drilon has filed a resolution seeking an investigation into the eligibility of former Calauan, Laguna mayor Antonio Sanchez for early release on the basis of good behavior. Drilon was secretary of the Department of Justice (DOJ) when Sanchez was prosecuted in the 1990s.

Drilon has also called on the DOJ to hold Sanchez's release until the eligibility issue is resolved. To this, Guevarra said the department "never insisted" on releasing Sanchez.

Sanchez is just one of thousands of inmates whose sentences are being recomputed by prison authorities in accordance with a Supreme Court ruling that declared a retroactive application for the law on good conduct time allowances (GCTAs).

READ: Computing the GCTA

Enacted in 2013, Republic Act No. 10592 provides the number of days that may be deducted from a prisoner's term on the basis of good behavior. The law empowers the leader of the Bureau of Corrections and of the Bureau of Jail Management and Penology to determine GCTAs that may be granted to inmates.

Corrections chief Nicanor Faeldon said the bureau has yet to review Sanchez's records but has initially found that he may not be released soon on account of "not good behaviors." While detained in the maximum security compound of the New Bilibid Prison, the former mayor had been charged with possessing illegal drugs.

Though prison rule violations may result in ineligibility for GCTAs for certain time periods, Faeldon said no single act—not even the commission of a crime, which he said can lead to separate charges—can permanently disqualify an inmate from being granted GCTAs.

Some lawmakers, however, said Sanchez should not be qualified for GCTAs because he was convicted of "heinous crimes."

Section 1 of RA 10592, the part of the measure which amended Article 29 of the Revised Penal Code, provides rules for the release of inmates under "preventive imprisonment," or those whose cases have not yet been decided.

The law says a person under preventive imprisonment should be "immediately released" if he or she has stayed in jail for a period equal to the maximum prison term prescribed for the crime he or she was charged with. But it comes with an exception: "recidivists, habitual delinquents, escapees and persons charged with heinous crimes are excluded from the coverage of this Act."

Section 3 of the same law, the part that discusses GCTAs, does not provide any distinction on crimes and penalties.

Guevarra said he has ordered the BuCor to conduct a "strict recomputation" of GCTAs in all cases involving heinous crimes.

The BuCor has already released around 200 inmates who were deemed to have fully served their sentences because of deductions brought on by GCTAs. — BM, GMA News