Due to safety concerns Sen. Bato ‘unavailable’ — lawyer

A lawyer for Senator Ronald “Bato” dela Rosa said his client is avoiding public appearances because “his personal safety is at stake” in connection with the reported arrest warrant against him from the International Criminal Court (ICC).

This was according to Atty. Israelito Torreon in a television interview when he was asked about the senator’s status and if he was in hiding, considering his absence from the Senate.

Torreon said the personal safety of Dela Rosa is at stake. “I can only speculate because I cannot speak for him even though I am his lawyer. He is just making himself unavailable.”

He explained that it is because it is not clear what the policy is, as there is no law on how to deal with surrender.

“Because our government is very clear that they will up the modality of surrender instead of extradition under Section 17 of Republic Act 9851,” said Torreon, referring to the Philippine Act on Crimes Against International Humanitarian Law, Genocide, and Other Crimes Against Humanity.

Torreon noted that ICC member states like Germany, Switzerland, Austria, Poland, and Australia have national laws on how to conduct surrender.

He said the Philippines had none when it was still a member before withdrawing in 2019.

“We are the only ones who are so desperate to surrender our national, our citizen there in The Hague, Netherlands, without a clear basis and without a clear procedure,” he said, adding, “The person is just kidnapped, not brought before our court, when we have working courts, we have a healthy prosecution service here.”

The lawyer said he last spoke with Dela Rosa before 08 November, but their discussion was about the protests and not the ICC.

He claimed that Dela Rosa is probably still in the Philippines.

On the other hand, Torreon expressed optimism that the Supreme Court will grant Dela Rosa’s request for a temporary restraining order (TRO) against the reported ICC arrest warrant once the document is officially issued.

He said that if the arrest warrant is actually issued, there is compelling necessity to present that to the Supreme Court and there is a clear and urgent necessity for the Supreme Court to act on the TRO.

However, Torreon said they will not preempt the Supreme Court and, if that happens, the possibility that the Supreme Court will grant them a TRO is very high.

During the previous administration, Dela Rosa served as the chief of the Philippine National Police (PNP) during the implementation of the drug war.