MANILA, Philippines – Government prosecutors have opposed a petition for bail filed by two of the suspects in the 2007 Batasan bombing.

In a four-page comment filed last month before Judge Ralph Lee of the Quezon City Regional Trial Court Branch 83, government lawyers led by Senior State Prosecutor Peter Ong said the motion should be denied since both petitioners – Benjamin Hataman and Bayan Judda – were at large.

“Custody… is required before the court can act upon the application for bail,” they said.

Hataman and Judda were charged with multiple murder in connection with the bombing attack on the House of Representatives which killed Basilan Rep. Wahab Akbar and several others.

The two were charged along with Ikram Indama, Caidar Aunal and Adham Kusain who were arrested and are now detained at the Metro Manila District Jail in Camp Bagong Diwa, Taguig City.

Indama, Aunal and Kusain have also filed a petition for bail which is still pending before the court.

According to the state prosecutors, Hataman and Judda cannot ask the court to allow them to post bail as they have not been deprived of their liberty unlike their three co-accused.

“A person applying for admission to bail must be in the custody of the law or otherwise deprived of his liberty. A person who has not submitted himself to the jurisdiction of the court has no right to invoke the processes of that court,” they said.

The prosecutors added that “bail is the security required [of] and given for the release of a person who is under the custody of the law.”

“Before the court can act on the accused’s motion to fix bail, the voluntary appearance of the accused is not enough. They should first be arrested or they should voluntarily surrender themselves to the custody of the law,” they pointed out.