De Lima on Pasig judge: !@¿#%$&!
Justice Secretary Leila de Lima on Wednesday joined mounting criticisms against a Pasig City judge for allegedly railroading court procedures and virtually stopping the government from pursuing criminal charges against Delfin Lee, owner of Globe Asiatique (GA) Realty Holdings Corp.
“The gall of that judge. He was too brazen. It’s somewhat audacious, actually,” De Lima told reporters when asked to comment on the preliminary injunction issued by Judge Rolando Mislang that prevented the Department of Justice (DoJ) from conducting a preliminary investigation against Lee.
The DoJ was set to file a syndicated estafa case against Lee, his son Dexter and three others with the San Fernando Regional Trial Court in Pampanga in connection with the allegedly irregular P6.65 billion loans that Pag-Ibig granted to alleged “ghost borrowers” who bought units in Globe Asiatique’s housing project in Pampanga.
A disgrace
Mislang earlier issued a 20-day temporary restraining order stopping the indictment proceedings.
“This latest arbitrary and questionable act on the part of the judge can only strengthen the administrative complaint against him. Judges like that are really a disgrace,” she said.
Vice President Jejomar Binay, who heads the Home Development Mutual Fund (Pag-Ibig), had accused Mislang of committing gross ignorance of the law and grave misconduct by issuing the TRO and the preliminary injunction on the investigation of anomalous housing projects undertaken by Lee’s GA in Pampanga.
Mislang is facing charges for knowingly rendering an unjust order, through impartiality, that caused undue injury to the government.
De Lima said the Office of the Solicitor General would also file a separate administrative case against the judge.
The DoJ chief said Mislang should have exercised restraint in issuing an injunction, especially since he had already been ordered by the Supreme Court to explain the 20-day TRO that he issued last Friday in favor of Lee, on top of the administrative complaint filed on Tuesday by Pag-Ibig questioning the propriety of his order.
She said that during the last hearing on the case last August 26, Mislang had “forced” the lawyers from the Office of the Solicitor General to attend and to agree with the other party to file their respective memoranda within 15 days, which would have been on September 10.
De Lima explained that under the rules, the court should resolve the preliminary injunction within the same period of 20 days, which was why the Office of the Solicitor General did not object to the 15-day period set by the court within which to file their memorandum.
“What’s worse here is that we suddenly received an order granting the preliminary investigation. The order was dated Sept. 5. The OSG has yet to file the memo and yet the preliminary injunction was issued. What is this? This is really out and out railroading. I don’t know what’s happening to that judge. Long before the expiry of the TRO, he suddenly issued a preliminary injunction. So there’s something very wrong there,” De Lima said.
De Lima also expressed disappointment with Mislang’s apparent defiance of the Supreme Court, adding, “That’s really disrespect. Delicadeza and sense of propriety would have prevented him from acting on anything. He should have explained his issuance first.”
