A relative of jailed broadcaster Alexander Adonis has raised fears for his life when a powerful politician who got him convicted of libel had caused his allegedly unwarranted extraction from prison for a purported medical check-up.
More than this, the wife of Adonis believes the politician could now also be using Adonis to paint a picture of the solon as a `Good Samaritan.”
In a letter to Justice Secretary Raul Gonzalez, Gladys Adonis expressed apprehension over the fact that prison personnel pulled Adonis out of the Davao Penal Colony (Dapecol) and brought him to the Davao Medical Center for an unscheduled check-up last December 11.
“This came as a total surprise for him and for us his family who were not even given a chance to accompany him or meet up with him at the hospital. He was not seriously sick and he did not make the request for a check up at the said hospital,” Gladys said, adding: Although neither Lex nor us were notified about the questionable hospital visit, my husband was surprised to see members of the Davao media waiting for him at the hospital.
Reports that came out the following day indicated it was Davao Rep. Prospero Nograles who playing a Good Samaritan paid for the check up for my husband who suffers from tuberculosis.”
She added the reports also said that it was Nograles who asked Bureau of Corrections Chief General Carding Dapat to have Dapecol personnel escort Adonis to the hospital. Gladys voiced her displeasure (over) this incident which to us looks like a media and political stunt pulled off by the man who caused my husband to be incarcerated in the first place.”
`This incident only adds insult to the injury that my husband is now suffering following his conviction for the libel case the solon filed against him …” she said. “It is already painful enough for us to see him incarcerated for nine months now when his crime was only to be too poor to hire a lawyer and he was convicted while his co-accused were cleared of the charges,” she added.
In January, a court in Davao sentenced Adonis, 43, to five years and six months in jail after he absconded his right to present his side on the libel case filed against him by Nograles in 2001. Adonis said his inability to afford to pay for a lawyer has forced him to go into hiding.
The case stemmed from the reports and commentaries on the part of Adonis and other national reporters and broadcasters relative to the “Burlesque King scandal. Court records show that the reports tagged Nograles as the congressman allegedly seen running naked in a hotel in Manila after the husband of the solons paramour caught them in bed.
Although he was reportedly escorted by 3 to 4 personnel from the penal farm, I am afraid that something could happen to him during the travelthis has already happened in the past when prisoners were shot for allegedly trying to escape,” Gladys said as she asked Gonzalez to help secure the safety of her husband. (End)
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