Anti-corruption advocate hails SC warning on bogus court order

AN anti-corruption and anti-crime advocate praised the public advisory issued by the Supreme Court on April 23, warning the public against fake orders, notices, issuances, and advisories purportedly coming from the SC and other courts and offices in the judiciary to avoid falling victims to extortion.

In a letter of support she personally submitted to the office of Chief Justice Alexander Gesmundo on April 25, Monalie ‘Alie’ Dizon, secretary general, ‘Coalition Against Corruption’ and the ‘Kilusang Pagbabago National Movement for Change,’ said the advisory reflects other SC issuances under the leadership of Gesmundo that shows the Chief Magistrate’s “concern for the integrity of our judiciary and the importance of the rule of law at all times.”

Dizon also took the opportunity to call CJ Gesmundo’s attention to the goings on at the Olongapo City Prosecutor’s Office where a complaint against two of its officials was filed before Department of Justice Secretary Jesus Crispin Remulla and Prosecutor General Richard Anthony Fadullon last March 21.

The complaint alleged that Deputy Chief Prosecutor Ria Niña Sususco and Associate Prosecutor Lilia Elizabeth Hinanay-Escuso committed “serious irregularities” in handling the complaint to the prejudice of the respondent, a Taiwanese national and long-time locator at the Subic Free Port

The controversy prompted Fadullon to agree to transfer the preliminary investigation from the OCP Olongapo to his office (see related story here).

Dizon also praised Olongapo Chief Prosecutor Charlie Yap for volunteering to PG Fadullon to have the preliminary investigation transferred to the latter’s office to avoid any accusation of bias and maintain the integrity of his office.

Yap, Dizon bared, also did not dissuade her or anyone else from pursuing the complaint against his subordinates. “This shows his professionalism and impartiality as a public servant and integrity as a person,” Dizon pointed out.

Dizon also praised Secretary Remulla and PG Fadullon for showing their determination to maintain the image of the DOJ as an impartial body that dispenses justice whoever the party involved may be by ordering the transfer of the complaint’s preliminary investigation af the DOJ main office.

She added that to further erase suspicion, it would be to the interest  of the DOJ’s image to temporarily suspend Sususco and Escuso while the probe against them is ongoing.

Dizon also informed CJ Gesmundo that while the controversy at the Olongapo Prosecutor’s Office is no longer within the authority of the Supreme Court, it reveals the “scale of the problem” now engulfing the country’s criminal justice system.

Dizon averred it now appears that even prosecutors are being targeted by “unscrupulous elements to be part of their ‘syndicate’ in order to subvert the rule of law and our judicial system and illicitly benefit personally from their conspiracy.”

“If this can happen in Olongapo City, as what we believed has happened, it definitely can happen anywhere,” Dizon said.