A penalty well-deserved

National Task Force to End Local Communist Armed Conflict former spokeswoman Lorraine Badoy has been found guilty of indirect contempt after threatening to kill a judge.

It can be recalled that in September of 2022, Badoy came out with an online post that seemingly threatened Judge Marlo Magdoza-Malagar after he issued a ruling that she didn’t agree with.

“If I kill this judge and I do so out of my political belief that all allies of the CPP NPA NDF must be killed because there is no difference in my mind between a member of the CPP NPA NDF and their friends, then please be lenient with me,” she wrote.

Aside from that she also threatened to bomb the offices of judges whom she labeled as being “sympathetic” to the cause of the communist insurgency.

Now the Supreme Court ruled that she must pay ₱30,000 for indirect contempt for her “vitriolic statements and outright threats” against a judge.

This is well-deserved for three reasons. First is the bomb threat. Time and again the traveling public has always been warned to never fool around with the word “bomb”, not even as a joke. And that doing so would incur the full wrath of the law. If we treat bomb jokes seriously, the more we should take bomb threats seriously. And we didn’t think Badoy was joking at the time.

Second, there is always something to be said about taking things too far. We laud how dedicated Badoy seems to be when it comes to fighting the communist insurgency, this scourge has plagued our country for generations.

But like any zealot, she may not be able to see who the real enemy is and thinks practically everyone who disagrees with what she believes in, or doesn’t think the way she does, is.

Third, there is nothing to be gained with attacking our justice system or threatening to take justice into our own hands, no matter how justified we think we are. Those who even as much as imply that people should be allowed to do so should be made examples of.