Pasay judge appointed to appeals court

MANILA, Philippines—President Benigno Aquino III has chosen a Pasay City judge to be a member of the Court of Appeals, according to the Judicial and Bar Council (JBC).

Pasay Regional Trial Court Executive Judge Pedro Corales was appointed associate justice by Aquino on Nov. 11 but the appointment papers were only received by JBC chair, Supreme Court Chief Justice Renato Corona, on Dec. 21.

Corales was selected by the President from a list of five judges submitted by the JBC. Other nominees included fellow judges Maria Luisa Padilla, Severino de Castro Jr., Maria Elisa Sempio-Diy and Jonel Mercado.

Corales gained public praise in 2005 for speedily convicting a tricycle driver for robbing a Belgian delegate who attended the Inter-Parliamentary Union in Manila. The judge meted out the prison term and fine on the culprit barely 24 hours after he was arrested by the police.

Corales was also the judge who ordered the arrest of Korean actress Sandara Park’s father for an estafa charge in 2007.

The judge was last in headlines in July this year when he temporarily stopped the justice and interior departments from ordering the closure of off-fronton jai-alai betting stations.

Corales backed the restoration of the death penalty during a human rights dialogue forum in Davao City held in 2005.

“Imprisonment is expensive for the state, so the best way to deter criminality is to execute those with death sentences… If you don’t execute how long should the state provide and spend for their existence and how sure are we that he would not kill anybody anymore,” Corales was quoted as saying in an article on the blog (https://ccadp.proboards.com/index.cgi?board=news&action=display&thread=3107) of the Canadian Coalition Against the Death Penalty.

With capital punishment reinstated, criminals and would-be criminals would be thinking  twice before committing a crime, the judge said.

Corales will fill up the seat left by Associate Justice Ruben Ayson who retired in March. Corales was previously nominated to the earlier vacancies in the Court of Appeals and the antigraft court Sandiganbayan.