By APRIL ANNE BENJAMIN
WHILE Chit Estella’s death three years ago in a vehicular accident came in a split second, the resolution of her case is taking forever. The cause: conflict of schedules of judge and the lawyers.
“It is quite disappointing. Kung wala ‘yung delays, baka patapos na ang kaso (The trial should have been ending by now had there been no delays),” Roland Simbulan, husband of journalist Lourdes “Chit” Estella-Simbulan, who died on March 13, 2011 when the taxi she was riding in was rammed by Universal Guiding Star Bus and hit by Nova bus along Commonwealth Avenue in Quezon City.
The drivers, Daniel Espinosa of Universal Guiding Star Bus and Victor Ancheta of Nova Bus, have been charged with reckless imprudence resulting in damage to property with homicide.
Estella’s case is being tried at the sala of Judge Ralph Lee at the RTC Branch 83. Estella’s family members are represented by lawyer Arno Sanidad.
Espinosa is represented by lawyer Salvador Panelo while Ancheta’s counsel is Marvey Gonzales.
The court hearings are supposed to happen every month. Simbulan said that there had been so many delays, most of time due to the irreconcilable schedules of the judge and the three lawyers.
Since the court hearings started in February 2012, the case has only gone as far as completing the prosecution’s cross examination of Vito Jagunos, driver of Abbu Abbey taxi Estella was riding in, last December.
The most recent hearing was last April 2, when Simbulan, only the second witness, took the stand to re-establish the facts of the case.
Jagunos picked up Estella in front of Mercury Drug Store along Tandang Sora and Visayas Avenue and was supposed to take her to UP Ayala Technohub when two racing buses hit the taxi.
Estella was a journalism professor at the University of the Philippines College of Mass Communication and a founding trustee of VERA Files at the time of her death.
Lee, the presiding judge of the case was elected president of the Philippine Judges Association on October 2013 and this made finding common available time more difficult for the judge and lawyers, Simbulan said.
Simbulan added that without the PJA position, Lee already had to attend to many other cases, most of which he just inherited from the previous judge of the QC RTC Branch 83.
Simbulan said he did not expect that the case would be fast. However, he said he “couldn’t imagine the progress of the other cases. If this one, a high profile case, will drag like this, how much more ‘yung mga kaso na mga ordinaryong mamamayan ang biktima (how much more cases that involve ordinary people).”
Road injuries are one of the top 10 leading causes of death, according to the World Health Organization. In 2013, road injuries killed 1.24 million people, mostly 15-29 years old, in the world.
In the Philippines, there is an average of 34 deaths per day because of road crashes and many are still unreported. Also, the Philippine National Police Highway Patrol Group has recorded at least 3000 cases in January to February this year.
Despite the high number of road accidents, Simbulan believes that there’s no need for a new traffic laws to enhance the safety of travelling on the road.
“We have one of the best laws when it comes to road safety. New laws will only add up the list of the laws being violated constantly,” he said.
Strict implementation of the old laws, according to Simbulan, is what is needed. “Road safety should be a concern of everyone,” he said adding that people will only start following traffic policies “when the government agencies will be at the forefront of promoting this advocacy.”
As an example, he cited that most bus companies always manage to have their registration renewed even without the proper check up with the bus units. “Consider smoke belching, most buses wouldn’t pass that but they can still continue to operate because the government let them operate,” Simbulan added.
As part of his advocacy for road safety, he has taken the initiative to have his own vehicle examined every three months.
“As they say, ‘better safe than sorry.’ I do not want my own negligence to put me in danger,” he said.
(The author is a University of the Philippines student writing for VERA Files as part of her internship.)
