Court reinstates charges vs community doctor
THE dismissed kidnapping and serious illegal detention charges against community doctor Natividad “Naty” Castro and several others have been reinstated by the Bayugan City Regional Trial Court (RTC) in connection with the alleged abduction of a member of the Philippine Army’s Civilian Active Auxiliary in December 2018.
This was after Executive Judge Ferdinand R. Villanueva reversed the order dated March 25, 2022, of Judge Fernando Fudalan, Jr., who dismissed the cases against Castro and others on the following grounds: denial of the right of the accused to due process; and for lack of jurisdiction over the person of the accused.
According to Villanueva, there was no denial of “due process” as the prosecution conducted a preliminary investigation, and the court acquired jurisdiction over her as she was arrested by virtue of the warrant of arrest.
In the March 25 ruling, Fudalan noted that the prosecutor who handled Castro’s cases had failed to issue a subpoena requiring her to answer the kidnapping and serious illegal detention charges filed against her.
The court pointed out that a subpoena directing a respondent to submit evidence “is the most important aspect of the preliminary investigation that safeguards the right to due process.”
Also, the court noticed that Natividad was not impleaded in the original complaint filed by the Philippine National Police (PNP). She was only included in the supplemental complaint, it noted.
The physician’s participation in the alleged abduction of one “Bernabe Salahay” of the Philippine Army’s Civilian Active Auxiliary in December 2018 was also “unclear”, the court said in a resolution dated March 25.
Castro was arrested last February 18, 2022, on accusations linking her to the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) as its alleged head of the health bureau.
The Commission on Human Rights (CHR) has expressed grave concern over the manner of arrest of Castro.
