By: Dolly Yasa
BACOLOD City – The Office of the City Prosecutor here dismissed the frustrated murder and serious physical injury charges filed by an employee of the Vallacar Transit Inc (VTI) against siblings Roy, Ricardo, Jr., Emily Yanson, and Celina Yanson-Lopez (also known as the Yanson 4).
In a resolution dated Sept 19, 2019, the prosecutor said that the alleged perpetrators were not positively identified and the submitted evidence failed to establish the theory of conspiracy and/or evident premeditation.
“After finding no reasonable ground to continue with the investigation in view of the reasons already cited and due to the insufficiency of evidence submitted by the complainant which, standing alone, failed to establish probable cause to indict the respondents in this case,” the decision read.
Earlier, Atty. Raul Bitoon, spokesperson for the Yanson siblings, said his clients called the charges “baseless and totally fabricated.”
“For serious charges such as the ones supposedly filed against the ‘Yanson 4,’’ to hurdle the rigors of scrutiny by the Office of the City Prosecutor, they should be based on clear and credible evidence as to amount to the existence of probable cause and should not be anchored solely on presumptions, surmises, and conjectures,” Bitoon said.
Complainant Cirilo Alingasa, an employee of VTI which is the parent company of the Ceres bus liners, filed frustrated murder and serious physical injury charges against the Yanson 4 claiming that he was injured when the group’s supporters threw a bottle of paint thinner at him.
Alingasa said that he suffered severe burns on his right hand and believed that there was “intent to kill” him.
Aside from the Yansons, other respondents named were Police Brigadier General Noli Romana, Police Colonel Jomil John Trio, and several “John and Jane Does.”
