THE MANDALUYONG City Prosecutor’s office has decided to indict the owner and driver of a vehicle that ran over a shopping mall guard for frustrated homicide, a crime with less jail time penalty than frustrated murder that was earlier filed.
In a resolution dated June 29 and made public on Thursday, Mandaluyong Prosecutor Jofre Z. Andrion said the driver was not liable for frustrated murder since there was no proof of the vehicle “purposely” used to kill the shopping mall guard.
“While we do note that the crime may have been perpetrated with the use of a motor vehicle, the same does not necessarily qualify the offense to murder,” according to the resolution.
Government prosecutors earlier filed frustrated murder and abandonment of the victim under the Revised Penal Code, a more serious offense than frustrated homicide.
The prosecutor also dismissed the abandonment of the victim complaint.
The hit-and-run incident was captured on a dashboard camera from another car and went viral on social media. The video showed the driver of the vehicle leaving the scene after running over the shopping mall guard, who was directing traffic at an intersection.
In June, the driver voluntarily surrendered to the police and publicly apologized to his victim in a live-streamed press conference.
The Land Transportation Office (LTO) revoked his license and permanently banned him from driving a car in the country. — Diego Gabriel C. Robles