Duterte’s spokesman Salvador Panelo wrote referral letter for jailed ex-mayor Antonio Sanchez serving 360-year sentence

At a Senate hearing, Sanchez’s wife said she asked some officials, including Panelo, to write referral letters and recommendations to help her husband with his clemency appeal

Sanchez was given a 360-year jail sentence for rape and murder, but was recently set to leave prison after only 24 years behind bars, sparking outrage in the Philippines

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Antonio Sanchez was given nine life sentences for his involvement in rape and murder in two separate cases.

Published: 9:50pm, 3 Sep 2019Updated: 8:27am, 4 Sep 2019

The Philippines’ presidential spokesperson Salvador Panelo has been dragged into a scandal surrounding an ex-mayor serving a 360-year sentence for rape and murder, after it emerged he had written a referral letter to a parole board chief regarding an appeal for clemency by the convict’s family.

Elvira Sanchez, the wife of convicted rapist Antonio Sanchez, revealed at a Senate hearing today that the head of the Board of Pardons and Parole (BPP) told her to “ask for some recommendations” from government officials to urge President Rodrigo Duterte to grant her husband executive clemency.

She then recited the names of people she had approached. They included Panelo, Imelda Marcos, Duterte (approached through former presidential aide and now senator Christopher Go), and retired associate justice Arturo Brion.

Antonio Sanchez’s family, from left, son Allan Antonio Sanchez, daughter Ave Marie Tonee Sanchez and wife Elvira Sanchez, take their oaths at the Senate hearing. Photo: AP

Parole chief Reynaldo Bayang, who was at the hearing, confirmed the names.

While the Senate hearing was still going on, Panelo hastily called a press conference in the presidential Malacañang Palace.