A businessman charged alongside Senator Rodante Marcoleta in the plunder case over P75 million in undeclared donations told investigators that the senator had approached him for money, according to testimony relayed in court by the Ombudsman’s lead investigator.
Atty. Maria Melinda Mananghaya-Henson, director of the Office of the Ombudsman’s Field Investigation Bureau, gave the account before the Sandiganbayan Third Division, citing what donor Aristotle Viray had stated during the fact-finding stage. She appeared as a prosecution witness at the hearing on Marcoleta’s petition for bail.
The bail proceedings are meant to test whether the evidence against the senator is strong enough to keep him detained. Plunder carries no automatic right to bail because of the weight of its penalties, but the accused may still seek provisional release, which places the burden on prosecutors to show the strength of their case.
Viray, according to the notarized deeds obtained during the hearings, gave P20 million of the P75 million total. The remaining amounts came from former Anakalusugan party-list Representative Michael Defensor, who donated P30 million, and businessman Joseph Espiritu, who gave P25 million. All three documents state on their face that the money was tied to the donors’ backing for Marcoleta’s possible run in the May 12, 2025 elections, and the three deeds were notarized on separate dates that January.
Marcoleta, Defensor, Espiritu, and Viray have each entered not-guilty pleas. Beyond plunder, the four also face charges under Presidential Decree No. 46, the law barring public officials from accepting gifts.
Prosecutors maintain that the senator never listed the sum in his campaign filings or his Statement of Assets, Liabilities and Net Worth for the year. They have leaned on Marcoleta’s own words to argue the transfers were real rather than theoretical, pointing to a November 2025 broadcast in which he acknowledged receiving money from friends who wished to stay anonymous and referred to the funds as “utang,” or a debt of gratitude.
The defense has pushed a different reading of the money’s purpose and the court’s role. Marcoleta’s camp has argued that anything involving his campaign belongs before the Commission on Elections, which earlier cleared him over the non-declaration issue. State lawyers have countered that the senator’s own submissions described the amounts as personal funds.
In a sworn affidavit, Marcoleta himself said Viray “committed to donate to my campaign funds” if he ran for the Senate and later handed over the P20 million “in support of my senatorial candidacy,” while providing an additional P1.2 million to cover the donor’s tax. The senator stated that no official favor was sought or given in return: “Mr. Viray did not ask for, and I did not promise, perform, or withhold, any official act in consideration of the donation.”
