Sandiganbayan denies Bong Revilla bid to exclude justice in P92.8-M case - GMA Network

The Sandiganbayan Third Division has denied former Senator Ramon “Bong” Revilla Jr.’s motion seeking the inhibition of Third Division chairperson and Associate Justice Karl Miranda from participating in Revilla’s P92.8-million malversation case involving a non-existent flood control project in Pandi, Bulacan.

In a Resolution dated September 24 but released on Tuesday, September 29, the anti-graft court said Revilla’s motion had no merit and that “Justice Miranda must therefore proceed with his duty to sit and hear the subject case.”

The Sandiganbayan said that although Justice Miranda’s brother, lawyer Buenaventura Miranda, had represented former Public Works Undersecretary and state witness Roberto Bernardo, Revilla failed to show that Justice Miranda had done anything improper that would justify removing him from the case.

“Reiterating its Resolution dated February 10, 2026, which denied the first motion for inhibition filed by Revilla, the court emphasized, among others, that: (1) Usec. Bernardo is not a party to the case but a witness; and (2) it is the prosecution, not Atty. Miranda, which presented Usec. Bernardo as a witness,” the Sandiganbayan said.

Revilla is facing a malversation charge over an alleged ghost flood control project in Barangay Bunsuran, Pandi, Bulacan. Prosecutors alleged that government funds were released for the supposed construction of the project even though no such structure was actually built.

In its Sept. 24 resolution, the court also rejected Revilla’s assertion that Miranda treated Bernardo’s testimony as gospel truth when the justice disagreed with the court’s decision to grant Revilla’s petition for bail.

“With regard to the issuance of Justice Miranda’s Separate Opinion, the court noted that such Separate Opinion was replete with citations of testimonies of other witnesses and other documentary evidence of the prosecution,” the Sandiganbayan said.

“While Justice Miranda dissented from the Resolution granting bail to Revilla, this does not render his findings baseless or speculative, but simply demonstrates a difference in judicial interpretation and evidentiary evaluation from the majority of this Division,” the anti-graft court added.

The court further emphasized that as long as opinions formed in the course of judicial proceedings are based on the evidence presented and the conduct observed by the judge, “such opinion will not necessarily prove personal bias or prejudice on the part of the judge.”

“In other words, adverse rulings, without more, do not prove bias or partiality warranting inhibition,” it said.— MCG, GMA News