(CMFR/IFEX) – Lawyer Harry Roque, who is handling the class action suit of Filipino journalists against the president’s husband, Jose Miguel Arroyo, received several threatening text messages and a threatening telephone call on 3 January 2007. Roque received the phone call at about 10:00 a.m. (local time) from someone identifying himself as “Jun Santos”, warning […]
(CMFR/IFEX) – Lawyer Harry Roque, who is handling the class action suit of Filipino journalists against the president’s husband, Jose Miguel Arroyo, received several threatening text messages and a threatening telephone call on 3 January 2007.
Roque received the phone call at about 10:00 a.m. (local time) from someone identifying himself as “Jun Santos”, warning him to stop “lawyering for destabilizers.” The caller identified himself as a supporter of President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo and a member of KAMPI, the political party founded by the president.
Roque later received three text messages threatening to kill him and his family. One offered a P5 million (approx. US$102, 500) bounty for the lawyer’s head.
The first text message, which came at about 1:00 p.m., said “Atty. Roque, RIP (Rest in Peace), we from the Hukbong Bayan (Army of the Country) are continually watching you and your moves of betrayal of the nation. We are again warning you to shut your fishy mouth.”
A second message followed which again threatened Roque and his family: “Dura lex, sed lex. Our law may be harsh but it is still our law. Not all the time are you lucky. The end of you and your family is near.”
The third and last message said, “To all interested persons: we are giving P5 million/$105, 000 as a reward for the capture of Harry Roque, dead or alive. Atty. Roque is a lawyer of terrorist communist group in the Phils. A destabilizer, insurgent, an anti-American. Caution: he is armed & dangerous. Any info on his whereabouts, pls call or text 09152546579.”
The number turned out to be that of a mobile phone owned by the Public Affairs department of the Philippine Army, which denied involvement with or knowledge of the death threats against Roque.
“My strong suspicion is that Malacañang (the Presidential office) is behind these death threats,” Roque said in an interview with the “Daily Tribune” newspaper.
Roque is also part of the legal team helping a rape complainant identified only as “Nicole.” “Nicole” was raped by US Marine Daniel Smith on 1 November 2005. Sentenced to 40 years’ imprisonment by a Philippine court, Smith has been transferred to the custody of the US Embassy in Manila by the Arroyo government. “Nicole” is protesting the transfer.
