Cebu trader escapes with P5,000 fine

The Sandiganbayan has approved the plea bargain of a businesswoman linked to a fertilizer scam involving a former Cebu mayor, reducing her charge from graft to a lesser offense involving fraud.

In a 10-page resolution, the Sandiganbayan Seventh Division accepted plea of one Marlyn Mendoza Castillo, the owner of M.M. Castillo General Merchandise, who was accused of graft and corruption alongside former Carcar Mayor Mario Patricio Paraz Barcenas.

The complaints were tied to irregularities in the purchase of foliar fertilizers for Carcar, Cebu, in 2011.

The allegations stemmed from the procurement of 166 liters of foliar fertilizers through direct contracting, bypassing the mandatory public bidding process.

According to graft investigators, Barcenas facilitated the transaction that favored M.M. Castillo General Merchandise, which allegedly sold the fertilizers at an inflated price of P1,500 per liter, resulting in a financial loss to the government amounting to P239,040.

In November of the previous year, Castillo expressed her intention to enter a plea bargain, proposing to plead guilty to a lesser charge. This move was later approved by the Office of the Ombudsman.

“Plea bargaining in a criminal case is a process whereby the accused and the prosecution work out a mutually satisfactory disposition of the case subject to court approval,” the Sandiganbayan noted in its resolution.

“It usually involves the defendant’s pleading guilty to a lesser offense or only one or some of the counts of a multi-count indictment in return for a lighter sentence than that for the graver charge,” the court explained.

The court said it could not compel the prosecution to continue with the graft charges against Castillo since there was an agreement to allow her to plea bargain to a lesser offense.

Castillo was ordered to pay a fine of P5,000. She was exempted from paying the P239,040 as civil liability since the amount had already been settled by Barcenas and former municipal agriculturist Roque Rellon Sarcauga.

Both Barcenas and Sarcauga had previously pleaded guilty to the lesser offense of Failure of Accountable Officer to Render Accounts in 2019.