By Fel V. Maragay

SEC Commissioner Jesus Enrique Martinez said yesterday he was considering resigning after he was confronted with canceled checks and claims he accepted millions from the collapsed Legacy Group in exchange for going easy on the trust-fund deficiencies of the pre-need company.

?I will go into prayer tonight and I will decide. I will consult with my family,? said Martinez, who is due to retire on Thursday after serving at the Securities and Exchange Commission for seven years.

Martinez, who oversees the pre-need industry, was urged to quit along with other SEC officials by Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile in the face of the televised revelations by former Legacy chief operating officer Carolina Hinola.

Hinola had accused Martinez of receiving P5 million in Legacy funds from Legacy owner Celso de los Angeles as a wedding present for his son, Jesus Glen Paolo Martinez, so he could buy a house and lot in the Classic Homes subdivision within BF Homes Para?aque.

The house, according to the SEC official himself, belonged to a son of De los Angeles, with the young Martinez renting the property for seven months before the sale.

Testifying at the six-hour hearing of the Senate committee on trade and commerce, Hinola said P3 million in three manager?s checks was paid in April 2008. Legacy then paid another P2 million later to Michael Lirio, the registered owner of the Para?aque house.

The former Legacy chief executive told the committee that she met with Martinez at the Linden Suites in Ortigas, Pasig City, on Nov. 9, 2007, and handed him Pl,475,000 in cash on De Los Angeles? instructions. The money came from the Rural Bank of San Jose, a Legacy subsidiary, and supposedly was to pay for a 2001 Ford Expedition for De los Angeles? use.

The car was bought from Spin Management and Holdings Corp., a company owned by the young Martinez, whom his father said was in the buy-and-sell business. But documents showed that the used Ford was still registered in the name of Spin Management despite the sale.

De los Angeles maintained he never used any Expedition?he said his car was a Toyota Sequoia?while Martinez, who said he met the Legacy founder three times at most on official functions, denied the meeting at Linden Suites.

?I am denying it because of the fact that it could not have happened on that day. I don?t think I was there. I think I was out of town,? Martinez said.

Hinola said the SEC official even signed an acknowledgement receipt on her request. She said Martinez reluctantly did so. ?I clearly remember him say, ?Carol, baka that may be taken against me.? I told him, ?no sir, it?s just for my personal purpose?.?

But Hinola failed to present a copy of the acknowledgement receipt, saying she could no longer locate it.

Reminding Martinez that he was under oath, Enrile countered: ?The fact is that there is evidence now that Legacy bought the house and lot of the son of this commissioner.?

Despite Enrile?s comment, the SEC official maintained that his son paid P3.2 million in cash for the house from De los Angeles? son Nicolo, who is a commercial model like Martinez?s daughter-in-law, and that the deed of sale was registered in November 2008.

?I must tell you, Mr. Commissioner, you are lying here,? an annoyed Enrile cut him. ?I will see to it that you are disciplined.?

Senator Manuel Roxas II, chairman of the committee on trade and commerce, rejected Martinez?s explanation, noting that the two instances of alleged bribery happened while Legacy?s application for a permit to sell pre-need policies was pending before the SEC.

Roxas said the SEC had discovered Legacy?s non-compliance with pre-need requirements, including deficient trust fund deposits in banks, which forced the agency to withhold approval.

Confronted by Hinola with a text message sent to her cell phone, Martinez later admitted that he had been sending inspirational and religious text messages to De los Angeles for about a year before the Legacy scandal broke out.

?I don?t know why a connection is being established between him [De los Angeles] and myself. One of the reasons why I sent him a text message every morning was I felt something was not going right,? said Martinez, who was appointed to the SEC on the strength of his being a member of the Jesus is Lord Movement of Eddie Villanueva.