Court house killings

What happened last Tuesday in court when a Canadian, a long-time resident of Cebu City, shot a prosecutor, a lawyer and a doctor in the Palace of Justice was very unfortunate and brings up another challenge for the Supreme Court.

John Holdridge Pope was a retiree with several pending criminal cases. He first shot Dr. Rene Rafols, a pediatric surgeon, and his lawyer Jubian Achas in Branch 1, and then walked over to Branch 6 and shot Prosecutor Maria Theresa Casiño. The doctors and lawyer were killed. Prosecutor Matet Casiño survived the attack and is still in the hospital with a bullet in her nape.

Many questions were raised about the apparent breach of security in the Palace of Justice. Why was Pope able to enter with two handguns? Wasn’t he frisked or inspected by the guards when he entered? The guards there are usually strict about  inspecting visitors/clients transacting business in the Palace of Justice. Immediately after the shooting, security there become even stricter.

Why did it take some time for security in the Palace to react or even stop Pope from pursuing his rampage? The  court rooms of Branch 1 and Branch 6 are far from each other. The securty force could have intercepted Pope before he left one court room to shoot Prosecutor Casiño in the hallway.

The Supreme Court should review  security measures of  Palaces of Justice all over the country and do something to improve it. The Supreme Court enjoys fiscal autonomy, with its own fund. (Many ask why our courts have no air conditioning units and some have small court rooms.)

I think Supreme Court justices should step down from their pedestals and visit our courts to see for themselves the dismal conditions of some of these facilities.

It is hoped that all sectors of the community help and do something to address these concerns since our courts badly need attention to be more efficient in the delivery of justice.

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The political squabbles between Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile and the minority led by Senator Allan Peter Cayetano has turned nasty and personal.

Initially Sen. Miriam Defensor Santiago was candid about  getting a small Christmas gift of P250,000 from Enrile compared to what other senators received, a whopping P 1.6 million.

She returned her gift to Enrile and asked for an audit of Senate expenses. Enrile welcomed the idea who made a counterproposal that it should be the Senate as a body that should be audited. Sen. Panfilo Lacson came to the defense of Enrile and revealed that Santiago kept her house helper in the Senate payroll an that  her office rent of her building was paid by the Senate as well.

Then Sen. Allan Peter Cayetano came into the picture,  questioning the manner in which Enrile is running the Senate. He revived the issue of the influential role of Enrile’s chief of staff, lawyer  Gigi Reyes.

Enrile got so angry he revealed before the Senate that Cayetano’s father, the late senator Rene Cayetano, owed the law firm of Enrile millions of pesos before he left, and that the wood in Cayetano’s house had come from Enrile. Amid  insinuations that Gigi Reyes and Enrile are in an illicit romance, Enrile denied it saying that he was “too old for that. “

Here we are spending so much to maintain the Senate only to get this level of public discourse which has limited  public concern.

I think senators should stop their personal squabbles. The public gets nothing from it and they are showing a bad example to our people that apparently all the Senators are crooked because they all have skeletons hidden inside the closets.