Here’s what happened:

Past 11 a.m., there was still nobody in the courtroom, although the hearing was supposed to start at 9 a.m. Earlier, a few minutes before 9 a.m., a heavily-guarded Brig. Gen. Danilo Lim arrived in Camp Capinpin from Camp Crame where he has been detained since the Nov. 29 incident at the Manila Pen with the Magdalo officers. Lim’s eight-vehicle (including a six by six truck) security convoy included members of the elite units of SWAT (Special Weapons and Tactics) and SAF (Special Action Force), Traffic Management Group and regular police.

Vicente Verdadero, lawyer of Brig. Gen. Danilo Lim, and Rodrigo Artuz, lawyer of Col. Ariel Querubin were the first ones to arrive in court. They disclosed that Col. Arnulfo Marcos, commander of the AFP Custodial Management Unit, wanted to implement the order to handcuff the officers to the courtroom, a departure from earlier practice. The two lawyers said the officers refuse to be handcuffed. They also said they advised their clients not to agree to be handcuffed because they have not been convicted.

For a better picture of the situation, the detention center is located inside Camp Capinpin. It’s about two to three kilometers away from the heavily secured gate. It is just about 200 meters away from the courtroom. In the past hearings, the officers with their escorts just walked from the detention center to the courtroom.

At 11:20 a.m. Lim, Querubin, Col. Orlando de Leon and Maj. Francisco Domingo Fernandez arrived unencumbered. Querubin and Lim said their custodians tried handcuffing them but they refused. Asked why there was an order to handcuff them, Querubin said, "They want to humiliate us."

The trial judge advocate moved for the arraignment of the accused which the defense lawyers opposed for two reasons: one, there is still the question of not all the accused having exercised their right of peremptory challenge particularly Lt. Homer Estolas, which is a requirement before arraignment; and two, not all the accused were present.

That’s when the issue of handcuffing came up.

In the beginning, the line of members of the panel as articulated by law member Col. Marian Aleido was that, nobody was being prevented from coming to the court but it’s the accused who didn’t want to come. She said the issue of handcuffing is the responsibility of the custodians and is outside their jurisdiction when the accused are not in the courtroom. Once inside the courtroom, she said they may decide to waive the handcuffing order.

Aleido said it was the "convening authority," meaning, AFP chief Hermogenes Esperon, who ordered the handcuffing of the accused.

Other lawyers including Trixie Angeles, Alex Avisado, and Dante Xenon Atienza insisted on their clients’ right to participate in the hearing. Verdadero even volunteered to personally fetch his other clients, Lieutenants Estolas and Jacon Cordero, from the detention center.

Atienza questioned the double standard in implementing the order to handcuff the detainees. He pointed out that the four officers in the courtroom were not handcuffed. He demanded the same treatment for his clients.

It must have been a slip of the tongue or eagerness to railroad the trial per order from above or just plain stupidity that Maj. Gen. Jogy Fojas, head of the panel, said that they don’t want all the accused in the courtroom because in the past hearings the accused were unruly.

The defense lawyers protested. Verdadero disputed Fojas’ description of the accused.

They insisted on the right of their clients to be present at their hearing. Avisado asked, "Is that now the new official strategy?" He pointed out that the charge is conspiracy to commit mutiny. They have to be present in all the proceedings because participation of one is participation of all, and that a decision on one will affect everybody.

Since the lawyers questioned the order to handcuff the accused, Col. Marcos was put on the witness stand. Marcos underscored the principle of chain of command in the military. He said the order to handcuff the accused came from his immediate superior, Col. Ireneo Espino, camp commander based in Camp Aguinaldo. It was a verbal order, he said.

Why then did he not follow Espino’s order on Lim, Querubin, De Leon and Fernandez? Marcos said it was an order from Fojas to allow the four to come to the hearing without handcuffs.

So that means Fojas broke the chain of command. It also belied an earlier claim of Aleido that outside the courtroom, they have no jurisdiction over the detainees.

The panel was embarrassed by Marcos’ disclosure and was saved by the lunch break. They were supposed to resume at 2 p.m. but at 3 p.m., nobody was in the courtroom. To dispel the issue of double standard, they wanted to handcuff even the four who were in the court in the morning. The four, of course, refused. There was a standoff.

Tension rose as the detainees learned that Marcos had withdrawn ammunition from the armory. Against whom would the ammunition be used? Then we saw three truckloads of fully armed uniformed personnel being unloaded near the courtroom and going towards the detention center.

The camp commander, Maj. Gen. Delfin Bangit, was called in. It was 3:30 p.m. when the panel returned to an empty courtroom to resume the hearing. Not one of the accused or any of their civilian lawyers was present. Only the two military defense lawyers returned.

With nobody to try and prosecute, the panel adjourned.

The sense we got was, Fojas was eager to railroad the process because if the officers are not arraigned by February, the charge of conduct unbecoming of an officer and gentleman would be automatically dismissed.

Then we have to go back to the "original sin." The officers are being accused of mutiny for allegedly planning to withdraw support from Gloria Arroyo after she was exposed to have cheated in the 2004 elections.

Arroyo’s original sin as heard in the "Hello Garci" tapes has spawned more sins. We are seeing blatant railroading and gross injustice.

There has to be an end to this.

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Email address: ellentordesillas@gmail.com