Apollo Quiboloy’s lawyer on Saturday afternoon called on police to “stop their harassment” and leave the Kingdom of Jesus Christ (KOJC) compound.
“Ang warrant of arrest po ay hindi po siya lisensya para gawin itong continuous harassment against the accused. Yun po ang aming stand,” Attorney Israelite Torreon.
(The warrant of arrest is not a license to do this continuous harassment against the accused. That’s our stand.)
“Wala silang search warrant, warrant of arrest lang po, kaya sabi po namin baka pwede na po tigilan ito kasi more than eight hours na po sila dito, at hindi po nila nakita si Pastor Apollo,” he added.
(They don’t have a search warrant, just an arrest warrant, so we said maybe we can stop it because they’ve been here for more than eight hours and still haven’t seen Pastor Apollo.)
PNP personnel trooped the KOJC compound in Davao City on Saturday morning to serve the arrest warrant for the group’s founder.
Hundreds of police personnel were seen at the entrance of the KOJC compound in Buhangin District before dawn.
Quiboloy is facing charges under Section 5(b) of Republic Act 7610 or the Special Protection of Children Against Abuse, Exploitation, and Discrimination Act and under Section 10(a) of the same act.
He is also facing a non-bailable qualified human trafficking charge under Section 4(a) of Republic Act No. 9208, as amended, before a Pasig court.
Quiboloy has denied the accusations against him.
‘Offensive act’
In a Super Radyo dzBB interview, Torreon described the PNP’s actions as ” very offensive.”
“Very offensive ang ginawa nina PBGen. Torre. 3,000 ang mga tao dito na puro armado, ang dami nila, napilitan nga kaming buksan ang gate dahil ano magagawa namin eh fully armed sila,” said Torreon.
(What PBGen Torre is doing is very offensive. There are 3,000 people here who are fully armed, there are so many of them, that we were forced to open the gate because what can we do, they are fully armed.)
“Sana naman ay maintidihan ni Torre na pinayagan na sila na pumasok dito sa loob ay hindi ibig sabihin na dito na sila titira, na-serve na nila ang warrant of arrest sana naman ay umuwi na sila,” he added.
(I hope they will understand that they have been allowed to enter here, but that does not mean they will live here, they have served the arrest warrant, and I hope they will go home.)
Torreon stressed that he is now processing a demand letter to let the police units out of the compound.
Torreon noted that one KOJC member died while 16 others were hurt.
PBGen Torre, meanwhile, reiterated that they will not leave the KOJC compound until Quiboloy was found and arrested.
“We want to assure everybody that we want this to end peacefully,” Torre told GMA News Online.
He also slammed Torreon’s ‘harassment’ remarks.
“Wala sa libro yan ah. Hindi naman ito search warrant. Pag binasa mo search warrant, para sa objects yan, items yan. Kaya nga nakalagay diyan is yung location. Wala kaming search warrant sa tao, wala kaming hinahanap sa tao. Wala kaming akusasyon na may droga o baril dito,” said Torre.
(That’s not in the book. This is not a search warrant. When you read the search warrant, it is for objects, items. That’s why the location is written there. We don’t have a search warrant on the person, we’re not looking for anything on the person. We have no accusations of drugs or guns here.)
Torre said it was difficult to catch Quiboloy as he seemed to be playing games with them.
He said there were 42 buildings in the KOJC compound. One of the buildings was five hectares long. —VAL, GMA Integrated News
