Order already w/ police when Satur got on plane - lawyer

Contrary to earlier reports, Bayan Muna general counsel Neri Javier Colmenares told GMANews.TV on Monday that a copy of the court order allowing Rep. Satur Ocampo's stay in Manila was already in the hands of the police when they took the lawmaker on board a small airplane at the Manila Domestic Airport. Citing the absence of a written court order preventing Ocampo's transfer from Manila to Leyte, authorities boarded Ocampo on a Cessna plane with his wife Carolina "Bobby" Malay and Bayan Muna Rep. Teodoro Casiño. Judge Ephrem Abando of the Regional Trial Court Branch 18 of Hilongos, Leyte issued on March 5 arrest warrants against Ocampo and other suspected communist leaders for 15 counts of murder of alleged government spies that happened more than 20 years ago. Colmenares said that at about 11:30 a.m. of Monday, he and at least two Leyte policemen received a copy of Abando's order. It was reported that Ocampo got on the plane bound for Leyte, shortly before noon. "At about 10:30 a.m., Judge Abando announced on the radio about the order. At about 11:30 p.m. the Hilongos court released the written order to us. I was there and the policemen who received the order were there too," he said. He said the policemen who received and signed the order were Police Officer Elmer Castillon and a certain A.Y.A. Serrano who were under a certain Col. Valencia of PNP-Leyte. Abando's order stated: "Whereas premises considered, Congressman Satur Ocampo shall remain under the custody of the PNP-NCR, Manila police district -- Ermita, until after March 23." The same order said: "The police is hereby ordered to submit Satur Ocampo after March 23."