Former Senior Superintendent Cezar Mancao II surrendered on January 30, but on the first week of January, some blogs insinuated that he went into hiding because he was embarrassed about being involved in a video scandal with Senator Leila De Lima.
The story was picked up by blogs like balitangpinas.net and netizensph.com and it was shared by Facebook fan pages “President Rodrigo ‘Rody’ Roa Duterte Supporters,” “Diehard Duterte Supporters,” “Duterte Balita,’ and “Duterte Defenders.”
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But when you click on the link, all that you will see is a 13-minute and 36-second video compilation of two news reports about Sandra Cam, the president of Whistleblower Association of the Philippines, talking about how she has a copy of a video scandal of De Lima with Mancao and another about Paolo Bediones interviewing Mancao himself over the phone after his escape from NBI detention.
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The first part of the video was an interview with Cam over the alleged video scandal of De Lima and Mancao that she has in her possession. Asked why she has the video, she said it was because she’s the president of the whistleblower’s association, which allowed her to receive tips and proof from several people. Cam said the video could have been taken by De Lima or her partner, adding that she’s prepared to face the legal repercussion of releasing the video.
Is Mancao really the one involved in the video? “Well, I’ll keep it to myself first. I will keep it to myself first. Wait until the time that ano. Hindi ito ano, and that’s the reason why gusto ko hindi sa media. Dapat ko ito ilagay sa korte,” Cam said.
Cam added that this is why she encouraged De Lima to file a libel case against her.
The second part of the video was a news report about Mancao’s phone interview with Bediones, which showed his determination not to surrender after he learned that he would be moved to the Manila City Jail. Mancao said that he felt safer outside of the city jail, where he felt that his life would be threatened. He cleared that he did not get any help from any NBI guards during his escape. Mancao said that he felt he could ask for help better from his friends after escaping because the NBI was too strict in letting visitors in to see him.
The former police officer said that he knew about the threat to his life because some people went inside his room twice and he was placed under surveillance, with no one being able to identify those who watched him. He took these as signs that there was a threat to his life.
Asked what would make him come out from hiding, Mancao said that it would take an assurance from then Justice Secretary De Lima about his personal safety to do it.
Would he spend a lifetime as a fugitive? Mancao said that he felt that he would not be given fair judgment during the time of his escape in 2013. He emphasized that there was no witness against him, that he was already exonerated by a certain Dumlao, who turned out to be former Superintendent Glenn Dumlao.
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He said he talked to De Lima twice, asking the justice department to do their job.
What we know outside of the YouTube video is that Mancao escaped from NBI custody on May 2, 2013 for the reason stated above, based on his interview with Bediones. This alone is proof that the title of the article being shared by several Duterte fan pages is wrong, misleading. Mancao escaped detention and went into hiding because of the threats to his life then after he was detained for murder charges in relation to the Dacer-Morbito kilings.
In September 2016, another issue about an alleged ‘sex tape’ of De Lima and her driver-bodyguard lover Ronnie Dayan also cropped up, especially with several congressmen in the House of Representatives approving the showing of the said scandal during the probe into the Bilibid drug trade. Some photos surfaced online allegedly as screenshots of the actual sex tape, but those photos turned out to be not of De Lima at all. You can read more about it on our bust about how the De Lima scandal videos and photos online were fake.
Sources: (gmanetwork.com, politics.com.ph, newsinfo.inquirer.net)
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