ALAMINOS CITY – A woman tagged as the ‘drug queen’ of Western Pangasinan was sentenced to life imprisonment in a decision handed down last Wednesday by Regional Trial Court, Branch 54 here.

RTC Judge Jules Mejia penned the 28-page decision sentencing Delia Casipit who earned the monicker ‘shabu’ queen in the western part of the province for illegal possession of 51.8614 grams of methamphetamine hydrochloride or ‘shabu’.

Aside from the imprisonment, Casipit was ordered to pay a fine of P400,000.

The shabu and other paraphernalia were seized by elements of the Nationa lBureau of Investigation’s Reaction Arrest and Interdiction Division who raided Casipit’s rented house in Pandayan, Alaminos on July 7, 2003.

Casipit has a string of cases for illegal possession of drugs still pending in Judge Mejia’s sala as well as in other salas of the RTC in western Pangasinan.

In sentencing the accused, Judge Mejia ruled that Casipit enjoyed constructive possession over the 51.4886 grams of shabu taken from a room that she rented out.

“It is true that the said room is being occupied by one Chona Jimenez who according to Delia Casipit is her sub-lessee, however the Court believes that she (Casipit) exercises control and management over the entire area being rented,” the decision reads.

Judge Mejia’s conclusion was anchored on the relative closeness of Casipit and Jimenez, the latter being the live-in partner of nephew of Casipit’s husband which, the Court said, “will certainly engender a well founded belief that they are in partners in possession of the shabu found in Room No. 4”.

The Court also based its decision on the fact that the accused herself has five other serious drug cases pending before it and in the other branches of the RTC.

Casipit had admitted that she was in possession and was entrusted with a check in the name of Jimenez in the amount of P12 million since May 2003, despite the fact   that Jimenez was merely a sub-lessee of one of the rooms Casipit rented.

Jimenez was not presented by the defense to rebut the presumption of constructive possession of the shabu in Casipit’s possession.

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