To critics of Supreme Court Justice Bulacan judges, lawyers: ‘Observe due process’

By Orlan L. Mauricio

MALOLOS CITY—The Judges Association of Bulacan (JAB) and the Integrated Bar of the Philippines (Marcelo H. Del Pilar-Bulacan chapter) have joined hands in cautioning legal critics to stop advocating the resignation of Supreme Court Associate Justice Mariano Del Castillo because “it is setting a bad precedent that undermines the integrity of the entire judiciary.”

Regional Trial Court-Br. 84 Judge Wilfredo Nieves, JAB president, and Atty. Renato Samonte, Jr., IBP-Bulacan chapter president, assailed the trial by publicity on the plagiarism case filed against the SC Associate Justice by lawyer Harry Roque, Jr. in behalf of the 70 comfort women whose petition before the High Tribunal seeking an apology and reparations from the Japanese government was dismissed in a ruling penned by Del Castillo last April.

“The Supreme Court has created an ethics committee to look into the charges made by Atty. Roque. Let us not pre-empt the findings of the committee by conditioning the mind of readers and the public that Justice Del Castillo is already guilty of plagiarism. Let’s observe due process,” the Bulacan judges and lawyers said in a joint statement.

The committee will investigate Roque’s accusation that Del Castillo lifted portions of the court’s decision from three sources published in Yale Law Journal of International Law, Cambridge University Press and Case Western Reserve Journal of International law without proper attribution.

“Condemning outright the decision of the Supreme Court whose ‘ponente’ happens to be Justice Del Castillo is a bad precedent and tantamount to mob rule. We should always observe the maxim that innocence is presumed until proven otherwise,” Atty. Jose dela Rama, Jr, also a former IBP-Bulacan chapter president said.

A perusal of the controversial 34-page ruling of the Supreme Court revealed that Justice Del Castillo made footnotes and attribution to every portion that were lifted from the decision of foreign legal journals.

Earlier, Supreme Court spokesman and administrator Jose Midas Marquez said Justice del Castillo would be investigated by a six-member ethics committee chaired by Chief Justice Renato Corona and co-chaired by Associate Justice Teresita Leonardo-De Castro.

The ethics committee was tasked to submit a final report, including its recommendations, for the approval of the Supreme Court en banc or sitting in full session.