Supreme Court says ex-NPA leader Rodolfo Salas can post bail

The Supreme Court (SC) has allowed former New People's Army leader Rodolfo Salas to post bail of P200,000 for his temporary liberty as he faces a murder case in Manila.

The High Court's Third Division ordered Salas' provisional release from the Manila City Jail upon his posting of the cash bond unless he is detained for another lawful cause, according to a notice of resolution released Monday.

However, the SC denied his son's petition for the issuance of a temporary restraining order that would stop proceedings in the murder case before the Regional Trial Court of Manila "for lack of merit."

Salas was arrested last month on the strength of an arrest warrant for murder for a case over the discovery of a mass grave in Inopacan, Leyte, in 2006 that supposedly contained the skeletal remains of victims of the "purging" allegedly done by the NPA in the 1980s.

He is 72 years old.

In seeking his immediate release, his son, Jody, argued before the SC that Salas could no longer be prosecuted for murder because the offense is absorbed in his conviction for rebellion in 1991.

Their lawyers said the conviction was based on a plea bargain agreement that shields Salas from further prosecution for crimes committed in furtherance of rebellion.

Solicitor General Jose Calida, who represents the Manila judge in charge of the pending murder case, argued that the acts in the old rebellion charge did not include the present 15 counts of murder and could not be "automatically considered" to have been absorbed.

Arno Sanidad of the defense countered that the murders were allegedly committed in 1985 and thus fall under the rebellion conviction, which he said covers acts committed from 1970 to 1986.

The possibility of bail for Rodolfo was discussed during oral arguments on his habeas corpus case last week.

Associate Justice Alexander Gesmundo asked Sanidad if they would consider availing of the doctrine in the 2015 SC ruling that granted bail to former senator Juan Ponce Enrile, who was 91 at the time, on humanitarian grounds.

The Sandiganbayan also cited the Enrile doctrine when it allowed former first lady Imelda Marcos post-conviction bail in 2018.

Sanidad said they would like to move for bail but said the "closest basis" would be the case of ex-Bayan Muna representative Satur Ocampo, who is also an accused in the murder case and whom the SC granted bail in 2014.

"In a similar case pending in the Regional Trial Court, bail was granted to Saturnino Ocampo in G.R. No. 176830," the SC noted in the new resolution. — RSJ, GMA News