YANSON FEUD: Court suspends criminal proceedings vs Y4 lawyer

By Dolly Yasa

BACOLOD City – The Metropolitan Trial Court of Makati City granted a motion filed by Atty. Anna Isabella Galvez, lawyer for siblings Roy, Celina, Emily Ricardo Yanson Jr. or the Yanson 4, asking the suspension of proceedings and to hold in abeyance warrants of arrest.

The case against Galvez stemmed from the ongoing feud of the Yanson clan over control of their bus empire.

Leo Rey Yanson and his mother Olivia accused Galvez of making alleged false statements in the company’s General Information Sheet.

Makati City Prosecutor Joel Vedon recommended that Galvez be indicted for the crime of falsification of public documents and perjury.

A press statement from the Narvasa Law Office furnished to the local media Friday said that in a resolution dated Oct 28, 2021, Judge Xavier del Castillo confirmed the “existence of a prejudicial question in a separate civil action before the Regional Trial Court (RTC) of Bacolod City, which is determinative of the guilt or innocence of the accused in the criminal cases and must thus be resolved first before the criminal action can proceed.”

Del Castillo ruled that “should the RTC of Bacolod City find that the July 7, 2019 Board Meeting of Vallacar Transit Inc. valid, including the resolutions and corporate actions adopted by its board of directors at the said meeting and thereafter, it would follow that the statements made by Atty. Galvez in the company’s 2020 General Information Sheet filed with the SEC are truthful.”

Thus, there could be no falsification of a public document.

Similarly, if the July 7, 2019 VTI Board Meeting is upheld by the RTC of Bacolod, Atty. Galvez and the Yanson 4 cannot be considered to have made a willful assertion of falsehood and for Perjury to be committed by them, the statement further said.

Judge Del Castillo then said that both criminal actions for Falsification and Perjury hinge on the final determination by the Bacolod court of the pending intra-corporate suit between the warring Yanson factions in Commercial Court Case No. 19-119.

To avoid conflicting decisions between two courts, it is proper to suspend the proceedings until the intra-corporate issues are resolved pursuant to Section 6 and 7, Rule 111 of the Rules of Criminal Procedure, the statement added.

Earlier, the Joaquin Narvasa Law Office, legal counsel for the Y4 claimed that the Makati Prosecutor’s Office usurped the jurisdiction of the Regional Trial Court in its decision recommending the filing of falsification charges against Galvez.