By William B. Depasupil, Reporter

Warrants of arrest were issued on Friday by the Regional Trial Court of Malabon City (Metro Manila) against the prime suspects in the celebrated Ruby Rose Barrameda-Jimenez murder case.
In a resolution, the Department of Justice (DoJ) earlier found probable cause to charge the suspects with the crime of murder, a non-bailable offense. Ordered arrested by presiding Judge Hector Almeyda of Branch 170 of the Regional Trial Court of Malabon, were Ruby Rose’s father-in-law and lawyer Manuel Jimenez Jr.; his brother, Lope
Jimenez; Manuel Montero; Eric Fernandez; Leonard “Spyke” Discalzo; and Robert Ponce.
Jimenez Jr. also on Friday was reported to have voluntarily surrendered to police authorities in Angono town of of Rizal province, south of Manila.

A three-man panel of prosecutors from the Justice department, however, cleared Ruby Rose’s estranged husband, Manuel “Third” Jimenez 3rd, and suspect Roberto de la Cruz for insufficiency of evidence. Headed by Senior State Prosecutor Theodore Villanueva, the panel exonerated the two suspects in a 19-page resolution dated August 24, 2009.

The Barrameda family, through its legal counsels Rowena Guanzon and Anna Cristal, filed a partial motion for reconsideration before the Justice department questioning the acquittal of Third Jimenez.

Acting Justice Secretary Agnes Devanadera, though, has assured the Barrameda family that the victim’s husband was not off the hook yet and the panel of prosecutors was ready to amend its resolution if new evidence is presented.

The Barramedas, through their lawyers, presented two new pieces of evidence on Thursday that they hoped would convince the prosecutors to amend their earlier resolution and charge Third
Jimenez with the crime of parricide.

Guanzon said that one new piece of evidence they would present to the DoJ panel of prosecutors is a 2006 letter of Third to Ruby Rose. This evidence, the lawyer added, will prove that Third and Ruby’s marriage was already shaky. The couple separated in 2007.

“In that letter, Third Jimenez, told Ruby Rose that he wanted a separation,” the lawyer told The Manila Times during a phone interview.

The second piece of evidence, Guanzon said, is the most damaging as “it shows Third and a woman in bed together with his two minor children with Ruby Rose.”

“Our newly found evidence also shows that there was a ‘third party’ involved long before the couple’s breakup in 2007,” the lawyer added.

Ruby Rose’s elder sister, former beauty queen and actress Rochelle Barrameda, filed a separate affidavit on Thursday detailing the circumstances prior to the disappearance of Ruby Rose. The affidavit supposedly supports the Barramedas’ claim that Third knew all along about the plan to liquidate his estranged wife.

Rochelle said that her sister “regularly” visited her daughters, then aged 7 and 4 months, at the residence of her father-in-law, Manuel Jimenez Jr., in Las Piñas City (Metro Manila).

According to her, Ruby Rose made it a habit to “breastfeed” her youngest daughter everyday.

Rochelle pointed out

“I believe that he [Third] knows a lot about the death of my sister. If not for him, my sister could still be alive today. And who benefited from the disappearance of my sister? It was no other than Third,” she said.

“I know all the sufferings and pains my sister had suffered. I saw it all, except her abduction and how she was mercilessly killed. That is why it is very painful for me and the entire family that Third was not included as an accused for murdering my sister,” Rochelle added.

Lawyer Cristal said that based on evidence, Third Jimenez was equally guilty as the other accused.
“Under the conspiracy theory, the act of one is the act of all,” she added. According to her, there also was a “unity of purpose,” which was to kill Ruby Rose.

Cristal said that Discalzo, one of the three men who picked up Ruby Rose from the residence of her father-in-law in Las Piñas City, was a personal bodyguard of Third Jimenez.

“It was impossible that Third Jimenez did not know about the plan to kill Ruby Rose considering that his bodyguard was directly involved in the abduction of his wife,” the lawyer added.

Cristal said that it was Third who would benefit most from the death of Ruby Rose because of a pending “custody case” for their two children at the Las Piñas Regional Trial Court.

She added that the estranged husband of Ruby Rose violated the Family Code when he took custody of the two children—the eldest was only 7 years old when the custody case was filed, and the other was only 4 months old.

Under the law, Cristal said, children below 7 years old should be under the custody of the mother.
Ruby Rose went missing in 2007. Authorities were able to locate her body on a tip from an informant, who turned out to be Montero.

On June 10, the victim’s decomposing body was found stuffed inside a cemented steel case underneath the waters of the Navotas Fish Port near the BSJ compound, which is owned by Lope Jimenez.

Rochelle confirmed that the body was that of Ruby Rose based on the earrings and the clothes recovered.

In his supplemental affidavit to the Justice department, Montero disclosed that Lope Jimenez even ordered them to rape Ruby Rose before killing her but they did not obey him.

In his original six-page affidavit, he narrated his participation in Ruby Rose’s murder, claiming that they were paid P50,000 each to carry it out.

Montero had directly named Ruby Rose’s father-in-law and his brother as the ones who ordered him and four others to abduct and kill her.

Based on his account, Ruby Rose was killed inside the BSJ warehouse at Pier 2 of the Navotas Fish Port on the same day she was abducted.

According to Montero, it was Dizcalso who strangled Ruby Rose with a rope. Her body was then brought to a room of the warehouse where three men stuffed and cemented it in a metal drum used in transporting diesel.

He said that he was the one who welded the steel drum and the steel casing, which were then loaded on a truck with a built-in telescopic boom, brought to the Navotas Fish Port and transferred to a tugboat.

The drum and the casing were thrown into the sea some one nautical mile (1.85 kilometers) from the Navotas shoreline.

Ruby Rose’s car, Montero said, was torn apart and sold as scrap materials after three days, while her bankbook, plane ticket, passport and credit cards were burned inside the BSJ compound.
During interrogation, he admitted that he had participated in at least five other Mafia-style executions as ordered by the Jimenezes.

Montero identified some of the victims as a certain “Orsulino” killed on May 16, 2006, “Idic” killed on July 30, 2006, “Junior” killed on November 12, 2006, and a certain “Melvin” and a companion who were killed on July 31, 2006.