Sandoval named presiding justice of Sandiganbayan

MANILA, Philippines - After seven long years of waiting, Edilberto Sandoval has been named presiding justice of the Sandiganbayan.

Presidential spokesman Edwin Lacierda has confirmed President Aquino’s appointment of Sandoval.

Sandoval took his oath of office before Chief Justice Renato Corona at 11 a.m. yesterday.

“I thank God for all this,” he told reporters after the oath-taking. “I will do my best to implement the same policies of my predecessors.”

Sandoval is Mr. Aquino’s second appointee to the judiciary, after Supreme Court Associate Justice Ma. Lourdes Sereno.

Sandoval has been a member of the 15-member anti-graft court for 14 years.

“The whole Sandiganbayan community is rejoicing,” lawyer Renato Bocar, Sandiganbayan executive clerk of court, said.

Employees are now preparing to give Sandoval a grand welcome on Monday with a congratulatory tarpaulin, he added.

Sandoval, 69, Sandiganbayan second division chairman, had been in and out as acting presiding justice for the past seven years.

Bocar, in jest, had been calling him Sandiganbayan’s “overacting” presiding justice, considering how he held the position five times already since 2004, each time a vacancy occurred by reason of retirement or death.

However, though always a candidate, he was never named presiding justice in all of the five instances that he temporarily headed the anti-graft court.

Bocar said Sandoval’s appointment letter was signed by President Aquino on Aug. 17, 2010 but was transmitted to Corona only last Thursday at 5:30 p.m.

Bocar described Sandoval as a “very down-to-earth, very kind, very generous, very approachable, and very simple” person.

Sandoval’s private secretary and chief-of-staff Friedalyn Ilagan said her boss texted and called her yesterday to confirm the good news.

“Thank You, Lord,” she quoted a very happy Sandoval as saying.

Sandoval will be presiding justice for less than a year as he is due to retire on June 20, 2011.

Sandoval chairs the Sandiganbayan second division handling the P303-million plunder case against former Army major general Carlos Garcia.

He was first named judge by President Ferdinand Marcos in Oriental Mindoro in 1983.

In 1986, President Corazon Aquino appointed him Manila Regional Trial Court judge.

President Fidel Ramos appointed Sandoval justice of the Sandiganbayan in 1996.

During his 10-year stint at the Manila RTC, Sandoval was named as the Most Outstanding Regional Trial Court Judge of Manila for three consecutive years from 1991.

Born on June 20, 1941, Sandoval obtained his Associate in Arts degree (with high honors) and Bachelor of Laws (valedictorian) from Far Eastern University. Sandoval also took a post graduate training course at Harvard Law School in June 2006.

He heads the Criminal Law Department of the Philippine Judicial Academy.

Sandoval teaches law and is a Bar reviewer at the Ateneo de Manila University, Far Eastern University, Adamson University, University of the East, New Era University, University of Santo Tomas and Arellano Law Foundation.

Sandoval is married to Pelagia Sandoval, a retired public school principal with whom he has three children. – With Delon Porcalla, Edu Punay