The Supreme Court has warned judges nationwide against any sexual advances and acts of lasciviousness that will degrade their profession as officers of the courts.
This after the Supreme Court dismissed from service Judge Rexel M. Pacuribot of a Regional Trial Court in Gingoog for gross misconduct and immorality.
In its 51-page ruling dated December 14, the High Court also ordered the forfeiture of all retirement benefits of Pacuribot and has barred him from employment in any government offices. Some lawyers in Cebu are hoping that the case of Pacuribot will give lessons to other judges who have similar attitude of abusing their power and subject their court employees to sexual abuses.
The case of Pacuribot stemmed from two complaints filed by two married women – a court stenographer assigned to the court branch presided by Pacuribot and another woman who works as a clerk of the Gingoog City Parole and Probation Office.
The Supreme Court adopted the findings of investigating justice Teresita Dy-Liacco Flores of the Court of Appeals based in Cagayan De Oro City that Pacuribot for “over long periods of time…persistently solicited sexual favors” from the complainants.
Both complainants claimed that Pacuribot had taken them to motels on separate instances, and succeeded in raping them and in making them perform sexual acts against their will.
The Supreme Court found that, in the stenographer’s case, Pacuribot’s advances continued even in the office, because whenever the woman employee would go inside the judge’ chamber to submit her works, the judge would grab her blouse and kissed her neck saying that “she smells so sweet.”
In the case of the probation worker, Pacuribot would summon her to his chambers on the pretext of discussing probation matters, only to grab her, kiss her, and leave kiss marks on her neck and chest.
“Judge Pacuribot’s conduct indubitably bears the marks of impropriety and immorality…His severely abusive and outrageous acts, which are an affront to women, unmistakably constitute sexual harassment because they necessarily result in an intimidating, hostile, or offensive environment for the employees,” the Supreme Court justices said.
The Court added that “the audacity under which the sexual violation of the complainants were committed and the seeming impunity with which they were perpetrated by Judge Pacuribot shock our sense of morality.”
Chief Justice Reynato Puno said Pacuribot’s act “violated the trust reposed on his high office and completely failed to live up to the noble ideas and strict standards of morality required of members of the Judiciary.” – Rene U. Borromeo/LPM