Press Release
September 11, 2019

AUDIO RECORDING OF "GCTA BUYING" WITNESS, BUCOR OFFICER COULD LEAD TO PERJURY CASE IF IDENTITIES ARE PROVEN - GORDON

Senator Richard J. Gordon, Chairman of the Senate Committees on Accountability of Public Officers and Investigations (Blue Ribbon), and Justice and Human Rights stated on Monday that the recorded telephone conversation between Yolanda Camilon, witness on the alleged good conduct time allowance (GCTA) buying at the New Bilibid Prison (NBP), and Correctional Officer III Veronica Buño could lead to a perjury case if their identities in the recording are proven.

Camilon, who initially appeared at the Senate on September 5, alleged that BuCor officials and personnel sold GCTA for her common-law husband, Godfrey Gamboa, who is detained at the NBP. As she was narrating her transactions with BuCor officials including Correctional Senior Inspector Maribel Bansil and Staff Sergeant Ramoncito Roque, she mentioned that Buño was the one who kept on following up on the full payment for the early release of her partner.

Bansil denied the allegation and said that she never spoke to Camilon, which prompted Gordon to ask the latter to show their exchange of messages from her cellphone. Camilon played their recorded conversation instead.

While the audio file cannot be used as an evidence because of the Anti-Wire Tapping Law, Gordon said that the credibility of Bansil will become questionable if the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) will be able to prove that she is the one on the recording.

"Everybody talks about how bad it is there (NBP) that is why I am asserting it. What I intend to do is to come up with a compendium of laws that we would probably amend. Among the proposals are to split the BuCor into three regions and to make another penitentiary solely for heinous crime offenders," Gordon said.

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