In the Estrada case, the various criminal complaints against President Joseph Estrada which would eventuate as the charges in his plunder trial before the Sandiganbayan were filed with the Ombudsman while Estrada was still a sitting and an incumbent President of the Republic. In fact, some of the complaints were filed even before the impeachment trial started on November 20, 2000. Certainly much before the "second envelope" incident during the impeachment trial which galvanized an outraged nation into an EDSA II. The complainants were criminal justice advocate Dante Jimenez, human rights lawyer Romeo Capulong, noted trial lawyer Leonard De Vera, the late 1971 Constitutional Convention delegate Ramon A. Gonzales, lawyers Ernesto Francisco, Jr., Antonio T. Carpio (later Supreme Court Associate Justice), and Dennis B. Funa. One complaint which would be the core of the criminal charges against Estrada and which would ripen to Criminal Case No. 26558 was docketed as OMB-0-00-1756 (Romeo T. Capulong, Leonard de Vera and Dennis Funa vs. Joseph Ejercito Estrada, Dr. Luisa "Loi" Ejercito, Jose "Jinggoy" Estrada, Charlie "Atong" Ang, Delia Rajas, Eleuterio Tan, and Alma Alfaro; see Victor Jose Tan Uy v. Office of the Ombudsman et al., G.R. No. 156399-400, June 27, 2008). Because of his incumbency as president and the inherent immunity from suit that went with that incumbency, the Ombudsman did not proceed with its investigation of the complaints. It was only after President Estrada had been stripped of his immunity, as a result of his (implied) resignation from office on January 20, 2001, that the Ombudsman acted upon the complaints. On January 22, 2001, a mere two days after his resignation, President Estrada, now without presidential immunity, was ordered by the Ombudsman to file his counter-affidavit in answer to the complaints filed against him. On September 12, 2007, former President Joseph E. Estrada was found guilty of Plunder in Criminal Case No. 26558 by the Sandiganbayan Special Division and sentenced to reclusión perpetua. On October 25, 2007, President Macapagal-Arroyo granted executive clemency to Estrada. The pardon took effect the next day when Estrada accepted the pardon on October 26, 2007, at 3:35 pm.
