Convict also fined P800,000
MANILA, Philippines—A Pasig resident will spend the rest of his life behind bars after he was convicted of drug charges last week, almost two years after he was caught selling “shabu,” or metamphetamine hydrochloride, in a police buy-bust operation.
In a nine-page decision, Judge Abraham Borreta of Branch 154 found Arnel Millondaga, also known as “Choy,” guilty of violating Section 5 of the Comprehensive Dangerous Drugs Act, or the sale of dangerous drugs, and sentenced him to life imprisonment.
Millondaga was also convicted of a separate charge of possessing illegal drugs and ordered to spend up to 17 years in prison and pay fines amounting to P800,000.
Court records showed that Millondaga was arrested on September 8, 2007, after the Eastern Police District’s Anti-Illegal Drugs Special Operations Task Force caught him during a drug bust in Barangay (Village) Pinagbuhatan.
Senior Police Officer 1 Joseph Espinosa led the operation with PO2 Gary Gomez and other police officers who backed them up, documents showed.
Policemen who were part of the arresting team later testified in court that Espinosa posed as a buyer and, along with an unidentified informant, met with Millondaga, who offered him a sachet of shabu worth P300.
The accused was then arrested by Espinosa, who found another sachet of shabu in his possession, the witnesses said.
Upon cross examination, Millondaga denied the allegations, saying he just arrived from Quezon province, where he worked as a driver. He added that the arresting officers tried to extort P150,000 from him.
But Borreta gave greater weight to the testimonies of the arresting officers than Millondaga’s alibi. “Between his (Millondaga’s) statement and the evidence for the prosecution, the court finds the latter to be more worthy of credence and belief,” the judge said.
Borreta added that he found Millondaga’s testimony to be “fatally flawed and suffering from serious infirmities.”
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