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The Sandiganbayan on Friday dismissed another civil forfeiture case against the Marcos family and his cronies.

The anti-graft court's fourth division junked Civil Case No. 0007 filed against former President Ferdinand Marcos, First Lady Imelda Marcos, and spouses Fe and Ignacio Gimenez due to an estimated P267 million in ill-gotten wealth.

In a resolution dated October 14 , the anti-graft court concurred with the demurrer to evidence filed by the Gimenez couple on April 17 and 18, 2018.

The court pronounced insufficient evidences were filed by the plaintiff, Presidential Commission on Good Government (PCGG) and the Office of the Solicitor General (OSG) on July 21, 1987.

The accused also contested the civil case stating that the evidence filed before the court were "afflicted with defects" and were "mere photocopies."

The decision, inked by Associate Justice Alex Quiroz, noted that evidence filed to the prosecution should be original copies as opposed to the photocopied materials filed to use for the case against the Marcoses.

“It must also be stated that some of the photocopied exhibits that were submitted by the Republic to this Court are so poor in quality that the letters and numbers stated therein are already unreadable thereby making it impossible for the Court to discern therefrom the points being sought to be established by the Republic,” the decision explained.

The material were unreadable and "poor in quality " making it impossible to be used as a strong evidence and giving it no value to stand as basis for the case, the ruling said.

It also added that the plaintiff handed over unauthenticated documents and has failed to defend some of its affidavits thus acknowledging it as hearsay.

The Sandiganbayan pointed that the government also supplied defective evidence for its final compliance.

The documented evidence were supposed to remedy the photocopied files, however, it was only certified by the PCGG custodian.

“From the submission of mere photocopied documents, submission of unauthenticated private documents, submission of documents which are both photocopied and unauthenticated private documents, and finally, in failing to produce at the witness stand the affiants/declarants of the affidavits and declarations that it submitted in order to prevent the contents of the said documents from being treated as hearsay, it is apparent that the defects in the pieces of evidence that were presented by the Republic prevent it from successfully pursuing the present civil forfeiture case,” the resolution read.

"Considering the defects presented in almost all of the pieces of evidence that were submitted by the Republic, this Court finds that the Republic has failed to discharge its burden and so rules that the respective demurrers of the Spouses Gimenez should be granted," it added. Cristina Eloisa Baclig/DMS