Pasay City prosecutor approves indictment of Trillanes for sedition

March 15, 2018

The Pasay City Prosecutor’s Office on Thursday recommended the filing of inciting to sedition case against opposition Senator Antonio Trillanes IV in connection with a privilege speech in October last year disclosing alleged multi-million bank transactions of President  Rodrigo Duterte.

Senior Assistant City Prosecutor Joahna Gabatino-Lim, who signed the resolution, said Trillanes can be held liable for inciting to sedition instead of conspiracy and proposal to commit to coup d’etat.

“The charge for conspiracy and proposal to commit coup d’etat cannot prosper. The acts complained of do not show that respondent proposes to other persons the commission of the crime of cou d’etat,” the resolution stated.

“The utterances he made may have been suggestive to fall within the scope of inciting to sedition but it is not sufficient to engender a well-founded belief that he directly proposes to others a swift attack accompanied by violence, intimidation, threat, strategy, or stealth against the government,” it said.

The case stemmed from the complaint filed by a lawyers group last October 3 where Trillanes e accused the president of  having numerous bank transactions amounting to P2 billion from 2006 to 2015 to contradict his claim that he has no unexplained wealth.

In a statement issued by the Anti-Money Laundering Council (AMLC), it denied being the source of the documents obtained by Trillanes. DMS