A request to keep Ateneo basketball coach Tab Baldwin within Philippine borders is being prepared by the relatives of the late Rene Baterbonia, who want immigration officials watching the coach’s movements for the duration of the ongoing inquiry into the drowning deaths of Baterbonia and teammate Divine Adili.
Israelito Torreon, the lawyer representing the Baterbonia family, was careful to draw a line between the petition and any accusation of wrongdoing. The family, he said, is not pinning blame on Baldwin. The point of the order, according to Torreon, is procedural: to ensure the coach stays reachable while investigators continue their work.
“Dito muna siya sa Pilipinas. Wala po kaming sinasabi na meron siyang liability dito. Para naman po magtuloy-tuloy yung investigasyon, magre-request kami sa Department of Justice na may immigration lookout bulletin order muna sa kanya,” Torreon said.
What the family intends to file is a formal letter to the DOJ asking for an Immigration Lookout Bulletin Order — a tool that flags a person of interest to immigration personnel and logs their arrivals and departures at the country’s ports.
Behind the petition lies mounting public attention on how Baldwin runs his program. Old interviews with former Blue Eagles have circulated again online, in which players characterized the team’s preseason sessions as punishing and military in flavor — closer, some suggested, to a boot camp than to ordinary conditioning work.
Among the resurfaced accounts is one from ex-Ateneo player Shaun Ildefonso, who described a moment when teammate Gboy Babilonia came close to drowning during a training exercise — a recollection that has fed the broader questions now trailing the program.
