With a global manhunt for Senator Panfilo Lacson about to begin, the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) Sunday said it had received information on the lawmaker's whereabouts. But Ricardo Diaz, head of the NBI's counter-terrorism division, declined to say where Lacson was as doing so, he said, might hamper efforts to bring the senator to justice. A court has ordered the arrest of Lacson, who is facing charges for the murder of veteran publicist Salvador “Bubby” Dacer and driver Emmanuel Corbito in November 2000. The NBI said Saturday it was tapping the International Criminal Police Organization's (Interpol) to help in tracing the trail of Lacson, who has left the country to evade what he claimed was political persecution by the Arroyo administration. “We already have an idea but we can not give it to the media because it would be tantamount to telegraphing our moves to him. I know he's also monitoring us,” Diaz said in a phone interview Sunday. He said government investigators were not underestimating Lacson, a former chief of the Philippine National Police (PNP), because the senator “also knows how the cooperation among Interpol member-countries works.” He said the NBI started monitoring Lacson's movements last week, but the counterparts in the international community could not hold the senator because he was not yet on the Interpol's red notice. The notice is not considered an “international arrest warrant,” but will allow arrest warrants issued in local courts to be circulated in 188 member-countries of the Interpol. Once the Interpol issues a red notice, it can hold Lacson, Diaz said. Meanwhile, Lacson's lawyers are set to ask the Manila Regional Trial Court (MRTC) Monday to revoke its arrest warrant on the opposition lawmaker. Lawyer Alex Avisado told dzBB radio Sunday they would ask the MRTC Branch 18 to reconsider its finding of probable cause to indict Lacson for double murder. “Senator Lacson's lawyers and the Department of Justice (DOJ) are still at odds over the issuance of the arrest warrant. We will file a motion for reconsideration tomorrow. The court's determination of probable cause is not yet final,” Avisado said. Last Friday, the court's presiding judge Myra Garcia-Fernandez issued the arrest warrant against Lacson. Investigators and police have served the arrest warrant at Lacson's office at the Senate in Pasay City, and at his homes in the cities of Para?aque and Muntinlupa and in Imus, Cavite. Avisado said his client should not be considered a fugitive because he had “not totally abandoned his defenses in court” and that his lawyers were still representing him in the double murder case. Avisado said the arrest warrant was part of the Arroyo administration's scheme to persecute his client, a strong critic of Arroyo and her husband. “This is just propaganda against Senator Lacson ... This is part of the script being followed by Senator Lacson's political opponents,” he said.
