The three men arrested in connection with the hotel death of an air hostess in the Philippines were released from custody on Wednesday – because prosecutors expressed the lack of evidence that she had been raped or killed.
The trio – the only one arrested out of 11 for the death of Christine Angelica Dacera after a New Year’s Eve party at her hotel – were released when prosecutors returned the case to Makati City, which had earlier ruled that it was a ‘solved’ case ‘was, CNN said.
Prosecutors insisted that “the evidence submitted so far is insufficient to establish that she was sexually assaulted or raped” – and if so, who of the group that was with her was responsible, and many of the 11 said they were gay.
They also insisted that even though the 23-year-old Filipino maid had been raped, police had yet to show that it caused her death after she was found unconscious in her room’s empty bath on January 1.
Prosecutor General Benedicto Malcontento gave police until January 13 to come up with stronger evidence and to ask for DNA as well as toxicological results.
According to an initial autopsy, Dacera died of “ruptured aortic aneurysm” and made no mention of semen.
The verdict allowed John Pascual Dela Serna III, Rommel Galido and John Paul Halili to walk free on Wednesday.
“We did nothing wrong,” Halil told CNN in tears. Galido said the dead servant was “like a brother or sister to me” and insisted: “I love her very much.”
The other eight suspects who were having their party had to be picked up even before Wednesday’s verdict. All 11 faced a preliminary charge of rape with murder after the local police chief said that everyone present was responsible for not protecting Dacera and said that an ‘act of all’s an act of all is’
At least one of the suspects mentioned, Gregorio de Guzman – the son of the famous Filipino singer Claire dela Fuente – insisted that most men there are gay.
‘How did it become rape? I’m gay. “I’ve never had sex with any woman in my life,” Guzman told ABS-CBN TV, adding that up to eight of the 11 “are probably gay like us.”
He insisted he only remembered that Dacera was ‘happy’ during the party, and then gave her CPR the next morning after she discovered her unconscious in the bath of her room in the City Garden Grand Hotel.
Dacera was a flight attendant at Philippine Airlines (PAL) Express, who said he was ‘mourning the tragic death’.