Cebu RTC judge faces immorality complaint

CEBU CITY — A Regional Trial Court judge, who also presides over the Family Court, is now the subject of a complaint for immorality for having allegedly sired two children with two different women.

The complaint against RTC Judge Olegario Sarmiento was filed with the Office of the Court Administrator, which is under the Supreme Court, by a certain Arsenia Monsanto who appears to be neither of the two women who bore the judge’s alleged children.

The two women are said to be Elvie Layese and Flordelis Branzuela.

Records at the city’s civil registrar’s office purport to show that the alleged child of Sarmiento with Branzuela was born on Oct. 28, 1982 at the Miller Sanitarium and Hospital.

The same records show that the child’s given name is Junaflor Branzuela Sarmiento, with the judge listed as the supposed father.

Additional records also purport to show that another child, this time a boy born to Layese on Jan. 3, 1985 at the Cebu Maternity House, again has Sarmiento listed as the father.

Sarmiento is now 50 years old but has remained a bachelor.

All the records obtained by The Freeman from the civil registrar’s office were certified by registration officer Oscar Molo last Sept. 19.

Monsanto cited the alleged affairs of Sarmiento with Layese and Branzuela and the children he reportedly sired with them, as the bases for her complaint with the Office of the Court Administrator.

According to Monsanto, Sarmiento may have actually sired four children but that the other two could not be confirmed for lack of any records about them at the civil registrar’s office.

All that Sarmiento would say about the complaint is that it is an old issue. "Dugay na man na nako nga gitubag. Dili na ko ganahan magbalik-balik ana dong ha (I have long answered those allegations. I don’t want to repeat them)," Sarmiento said before hanging up when sought for comment.

Court administrator Presbitero Velasco was not available for comment when The Freeman contacted his office in Manila. A member of his staff, Hazel Tomas, said Velasco was attending an out-of-town seminar.

Sarmiento is the second RTC judge in Cebu to have been rapped for alleged immorality.

The Supreme Court recently removed Ferdinand J. Marcos after finding him guilty of carrying on an affair with another woman. His wife, Rotilla, had filed the complaint herself. — Freeman News Service