Lawyer dismissed for hiding murder records
The Supreme Court has affirmed the dismissal of a former lawyer for grave misconduct and serious dishonesty after he was found in possession of the missing case records of the murder of Ruby Rose Barrameda-Jimenez, whose body was found covered in hardened concrete inside a steel drum in Navotas City in 2009.
Senior Associate Justice Marvic M.V.F. Leonen penned the Court En Banc decision denying the petition for review on certiorari filed by Jerik Roderick V. Jacoba and granted the petition for review on certiorari filed by the Civil Service Commission and former Executive Secretary Paquito N. Ochoa Jr.
The consolidated petitions assailed the rulings of the Court of Appeals finding Jacoba, a former lawyer in the then Office of the Deputy Executive Secretary for Legal Affairs, guilty of simple misconduct.
In 2009, police officers recovered the body of Barrameda in a steel drum from the waters of Navotas City after missing for more than two years before her body was discovered.
The following year, the Department of Justice) resolved to indict Manuel Jimenez III, Barrameda’s husband, for parricide.
Jimenez appealed the DOJ’s resolution of his indictment before the Office of the President. The DOJ thus forwarded the Barrameda case records to the Legal Affairs Office of the OP.
In February 2012, then Undersecretary Ronaldo A. Geron of the OP inquired on the status of the Jimenez appeal, but the Barrameda case records could not be located.
Investigation conducted showed the missing records, with the draft decision, were eventually found in a locked filing cabinet used by Jacoba.
The case records and the draft decision were immediately forwarded to ES Ochoa, who denied Jimenez’s appeal for lack of merit on the same day.
After an investigation by the Office of the Executive Secretary, Ochoa authorized the OP’s Internal Affairs and Complaints Committee to issue a formal charge for grave misconduct and serious dishonesty against Jacoba.
He then directed the creation of a Panel of Hearing Officers and the Prosecution Panel.
The Executive Secretary found Jacoba guilty of the charges and dismissed him from government service. Jacoba appealed before the CSC, but was denied.
When Jacoba brought his case to the CA, the appellate court partly granted his appeal, finding him guilty of simple neglect of duty instead of grave misconduct and serious dishonesty.
The CSC moved for reconsideration while Jacoba moved for partial reconsideration, but the CA denied both motions, prompting the present petitions before the Court.
The Court in affirming the CA decision also imposed accessory penalties on Jacoba: forfeiture of all retirement benefits; perpetual disqualification from reemployment in the government service; cancellation of civil service eligibility; and bared from taking the civil service examinations.