Picture this. On one side, the entire government — investigators, prosecutors, police, and above all, public funds that never run out. On the other side, you, standing alone. One lawyer. A little savings. That is all.

This is not a fair fight. And that is exactly where the danger begins.

Ten men spent last Friday night in a police station. Not because they were convicted of anything. Not because a court found they had lied. They spent that night in custody because ₱72,000 — ₱18,000 for each of four perjury counts — could not be raised before the Las Piñas court closed for the weekend.

They are publicly known as the “maleta boys,” former bodyguards who came forward to testify before the Senate about the flood-control scandal. On August 7, a Las Piñas court issued warrants for their arrest on perjury charges. Ten failed to post bail in time and were held overnight. One had already returned to his home province for a death in the family, still carrying an active warrant. The next day, roughly one million pesos was raised to free the group. Their lawyer, asked where the money came from, said only that it would be difficult to explain.

Four of the eighteen had, by then, recanted their original statements. Whether they recanted because they lied the first time, or because ten nights in a cell and a mounting bill broke something in them, is a question this column will not answer, because no one outside those four men actually knows. That uncertainty is the entire point. A system that can make a witness this afraid, this fast, will always leave us guessing which version was the honest one.

The government does not need to win in order to punish. It only needs to file.

This is what the presumption of innocence exists to prevent, and why it keeps failing to. The doctrine holds that a person is innocent until the state proves guilt beyond a reasonable doubt. It does not say what happens to a life while that proof is still being assembled. A warrant does not wait for a verdict. Neither does a bail bond, or a bill that keeps growing.

One case, a person of modest means can fight. Four counts, timed before a court’s weekend closing, is closer to a stress test — run by an institution funded by a treasury that never runs short, against defendants who pay from savings that do.

Consider the other case unfolding the same week. Vice President Sara Duterte remains in an active impeachment trial, and on August 11 the Department of Justice filed a grave threats case against her in a Quezon City court. Her legal team has said publicly that none of her defense costs come from public funds — that the money is hers, not the taxpayer’s.

A vice president and a group of former bodyguards rarely share a sentence. Strip away the politics and what is left is identical. Each is funding a defense against the very institution that holds every procedural advantage — timing, jurisdiction, how many cases it can file, and how fast. Neither draws from public money. Both draw from what they have left.

This is not an argument about guilt. It is an observation about method. When the speed and volume of legal action against a person track their political inconvenience rather than the strength of the evidence against them, the presumption of innocence ceases to be a courtroom formality. It becomes the only thing standing between an ordinary Filipino and a state that has already decided, before any verdict, how expensive their defense should be.

Rights that bend according to who holds power are not rights. They are permissions, extended or withdrawn depending on whose turn it is to need them. Today it is a handful of witnesses and a vice president. The mechanism that reaches them does not verify credentials before reaching the next name.

Kung ang batas ay ginagamit para ubusin ang pera mo bago ka pa mahatulan, hindi na ito katarungan. Sandata na ito.

Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and are intended to encourage public discussion on governance and national issues. They do not represent any official position of the institutions the author may be affiliated with.
Paul Y. Chua, PhD, holds doctoral degrees in Fiscal Management and Peace and Security, a master’s degree in National Security Administration. He writes on Philippine governance, national security, transportation, and public policy.