Jose Villarosa, Ex-Mayor of San Jose, Occidental Mindoro Convicted

In a decision penned by Associate Justice Reynaldo Cruz and with the concurrence of Justices Efren N. de la Cruz and Michael Frederick L. Musngi, the anti-graft court found former Mayor of San Jose Occidental Mindoro, Jose Villarosa, guilty beyond reasonable doubt on 7 December 2016 of nine counts of violation of Section 3(e) of the Anti-Graft and Corrupt Practices Act (Republic Act No. 3019) which states:

Section 3(e) Causing any undue injury to any party, including the Government, or giving any private party any unwarranted benefits, advantage or preference in the discharge of his official administrative or judicial functions through manifest partiality, evident bad faith or gross inexcusable negligence. This provision shall apply to officers and employees of offices or government corporations charged with the grant of licenses or permits or other concessions. Villarosa was sentenced to prison terms ranging from six years to 10 years, for each count or minimum of 54 and maximum of 90 years. He was also perpetually barred from holding public office.

The Ombudsman prosecutors proved during the trial that from September 2010 to June 2011, Villarosa issued nine extraction permits to quarry sand to GEM CHB Maker, Timoteo Aguilar, Arvi Dolojan, Andres Pablo, R.D. Go Concrete Products, Jojo Pojas, Emilia De Lara, Antonio Villaroza and Jessie Glass and Aluminum Enterprise, with evident bad faith and in violation of the Local Government Code (LGC).

The Decision stated, “Having already been expressly notified by the proper party, in this case the PENRO, that he had no right to issue the subject extraction permits, he not only stubbornly defied the same but also insistently refused to acknowledge the right of the Provincial Governor to issue such extraction permits that are expressly and exclusively granted to the latter by the LGC.”

While Villarosa claimed to not have received any part of the profit from quarrying activities, the court said he violated Section 3(e) of the graft law’s prohibition on giving any private party unwarranted benefits.

“These private individuals clearly benefited from the illegal issuance by the accused of the extraction permits since this paved the way for them to conduct extraction and quarrying activities without the proper authorization—presumably, to their own profit and advantage, for why else would they persist even after repeated notices that the activities they were engaged in were illegal?” the decision stated.

Villarosa was mayor from 2010 to 2013. ●