The Supreme Court (SC) has slapped Court of Appeals (CA) Associate Justice Normandie Pizarro with a P100,000 fine after an anonymous complainant submitted pictures of him gambling in a casino in Clark, Pampanga.
In a recent 10-page en banc decision, the SC said Pizarro violated Section 14(4)(a) of Presidential Decree Number 1869, which prohibits government officials from gambling.
“Judges should behave at all times so as to promote public confidence in the integrity and impartiality in the judiciary, and avoid the appearance of impropriety in all their activities,” read the decision penned by Associate Justice Samuel Martires. “Thus, any demeaning act of a judge degrades the institution he represents.”
But, the SC only imposed a fine, instead of dismissal, as administrative sanction for conduct unbecoming of a member of the judiciary.
The SC cited this was Pizarro’s first transgression and he immediately admitted to his indiscretion. It also noted “the number of years he has been in government service.”
Only Associate Justice Marvic Leonen dissented from the ruling, as he sought the harsher penalty of dismissal. Associate Justice Lucas Bersamin inhibited because of his “close relations” to Pizarro, while Chief Justice Maria Lourdes Sereno is on indefinite leave.
The anonymous complainant claimed Pizarro would lose millions due to gambling and insinuated that he resorted to “selling” decisions to support his addiction.
Pizarro admitted to being the person in the picture but claimed he only accompanied a balik Bayan friend and “played a little in a parlor game fashion without big stakes and without their identities introduced or made known.”
He also cried foul about the tipster’s description of him as the “most corrupt justice in the Philippines,” pointing out that previous administrative complaints against him were dismissed.
Pizarro recently became controversial because of the CA’s January 2018 decision to set aside the finding of probable cause to put former Palawan Governor Joel Reyes on trial for the murder of broadcaster Gerry Ortega.
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