BY EVANGELINE DE VERA

JUSTICE Secretary Raul Gonzalez yesterday said he wants to determine if a subsidiary of Ayala Land Inc., owner of the Glorietta malls in Makati, has some criminal or administrative liability for the explosion at the Glorietta 2 in October last year.

He said documents submitted by a multi-agency investigation task force that investigated the blast indicated that Ayala Property Management Corp. (APMC) has direct supervision over the Glorietta complex.

"As far as I am concerned, they are not yet off the hook. As far as juridical authority is concerned, the officers should be included. This is the corporation that supervises the complex; they are the ones who hire the agencies which clean the place, maintain the facilities, and see to it that the facilities are properly kept and functioning properly and that the operation will not endanger life and limb," he said.

The government task force last week released its final report on the October 19 explosion that killed 11 persons and injured at least 100 others. It said the blast was caused by a mixture of gases, a finding being disputed by Ayala Land Inc. (ALI).

The task force filed charges of reckless imprudence resulting in multiple homicide and gross negligence before the DOJ last Friday against 15 persons, including officers of APMC but not of ALI.

The task force said the 15 respondents failed to observe "due care and diligence" in preventing methane gas buildup at the basement of Glorietta 2.

Gonzalez said he would have to go through the charge sheet before assembling a panel of prosecutors that would conduct a preliminary investigation.

Officials of ALI, he said, would be included in the charge sheet if warranted.

Ayala has said its investigators have found bomb residues in the blast site.

Gonzalez earlier said that if anything, results of the Ayala probe would be self-serving. – With Jocelyn Montemayor