The Four-eyed Journal » Law

A common lesson from the cases of Sen Lacson and Rep Singson

jhay — Tue, 04 Jan 2011 05:02:43 +0000

If there’s anything to compare in the cases of Sen Lacson and Rep Singson, the former being accused of murder and the latter facing a drug trafficking case in Hong Kong, is the credibility, capabilities and resolve of the law enforcement agencies after one and prosecuting the other.

Yes, I am talking about the difference between the Hong Kong law enforcement agencies and our very own PNP, NBI, etc.

It is bewildering how Rep Singson walked out of a Philippine airport and boarded his plane to Hong Kong with cocaine in his hand carried luggage without getting into trouble with local airport security or customs officials.

It could have been any or a combination of the three:

Airport authorities were simply incompetent to have missed the cocaine in the hand carried luggage.
Airport authorities discovered the cocaine but knowing it was carried by a Congressman and no less than the son of Gov Chavit Singson – a former henchman of Erap, they simply decided to keep silent about it and let him by. Conveniently forgetting that even though they were just lowly airport security, no one is above the law they are sworn to enforce, especially a law maker.
Airport authorities were bribed to keep quite and even facilitated Rep Singson’s trouble-free exit from the country.

Over at Hong Kong, it was the complete opposite. Hong Kong authorities knew exactly what to do; enforce their laws which prohibits the possession and trafficking of illegal drugs and imposes a heavy punishment for it.

Even if it was Rep Singson, a member of a foreign Congress, they had to enforce the law, place him under arrest and initiate legal proceedings against him.

Further embarrassment

Back home his colleagues in both Houses of Congress are saying he should be expelled from Congress because he has committed a crime and since he is going to admit guilt it is but obvious that he take the gentleman’s route of giving up his seat in Congress, to save the it from further embarrassment.

However, it is not just Rep Singson who has put Congress and the government in this embarrassing situation, the air port authorities who let him pass through is also equally to blame.

Had they only did their job right Rep Singson would’ve never left the country and gone to Hong Kong. He should have landed in jail.

Instead, the Hong Kong police showed us how it is supposed to be done. It’s like asking the Hong Kong authorities to do our own house cleaning for us.

Connections, connections, connections

Now, as for Sen Lacon’s case, it’s without a doubt the former PNP chief still wields influence over our own law enforcement agencies. The fact that he is still at large in the country shows that someone in the DOJ or NBI is either inept for the job or working from the inside to give the fugitive senator a heads up on his pursuers.

They could put Lacson’s lawyer, who is in still in contact with him, in 24/7 surveillance as he could provide, albeit unwittingly, assistance to the Senator’s capture.

I’m not saying the Hong Kong authorities are role-models in law enforcement, they too have their share of red tape. But the fact that they have been able to do their duties whereas their Filipino counterparts have failed or neglected to do, just goes to show that we would continue be an embarrassment in the international scene while our own citizens are suffering injustice and still having no confidence in our own government and its agents.

Indeed, drug trafficking and murder are two different crimes that make up for different cases, but the manner in which our law enforcement agencies will go about doing their jobs will still determine the outcome of these cases.

Just look at what happened to the Vizconde murder case. ‘Nuff said.

1987 Constitution of The Republic of the Philippines

jhay — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 22:58:58 +0000

Though there are a lot of sources for the full text of the 1987 Constitution of the Philippines on the web most of it are in html or web page format, some with embedded html tags that ruins the layout of the text whenever it is copied from the web and pasted into your word processor. Others have font styles that would eat-up a lot of your printer ink and require some tweaking before it becomes printer-friendly.

If you like to save time, paper and printer ink or toner, here’s a the full text of the 1987 Constitution in a printer-friendly style and easily downloadable PDF or Word document format:

1987 Philippine Constitution

Just download using the links above and we all must thank the PCIJ for this easily-accessible and printable copy of our country’s Constitution.

The Anti-Child Pornography Act of 2009 – A few reservations

jhay — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 22:00:17 +0000

It’s a welcome development that Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo has signed into law R.A. 9775 or the Anti-Child Pornography Act of 2009 last November 17, 2009. Under this new law, child pornography is now referred to as:

xxx “any public or private representation, by whatever means, of a child engaged in real or simulated explicit sexual activities or any representation of the sexual parts of a child for primarily sexual purposes.” xxx

The form of child pornography has been expanded from the traditional forms like videos or photos of real children but also digitally-created images and it also includes audio recordings or representations of a child engaged in explicit sexual activity.

The law was created in the context of today’s inter-connected world of computers, the Internet and mobile phones because the mere possession of child pornography is now illegal and would land you in jail.

Aside from creating the Inter-Agency Council against Child Pornography, the new law somehow deputizes Internet Service Providers or ISPs by giving them additional duties under Section 5 of the Act:

xxx

SEC. 5. Duties of an Internet Service Provider (ISP). – An ISP shall:

(a) Prevent access or transmittal of child pornography materials by any person and shall install a blocking system to prevent access to such materials;

(b) Within seven (7) days, report the presence thereof, as well as the particulars of the person maintaining, hosting, distributing or in any manner contributing to the Internet address, to the proper authorities; and

(c) Preserve such evidence for purposes of investigation and prosecution by relevant authorities.

An ISP shall, upon the request of proper authorities, furnish the particulars of users who gained or attempted to gain access to an Internet address which contains child pornography materials.

An ISP who shall knowingly, willfully and intentionally violate this provision shall be subject to the penalty provided under Section 13(e) of this Act.

xxx

Privacy and net neutrality issues

And here is where my reservations come from, ISPs are now mandated to install a blocking system to prevent access to and transmittal of child pornography materials, how would they know which data in their networks are such materials or not? It provides in effect, some filtering mechanism at the ISP level, just like what is going in China today. Imagine the threat to our freedom of access to information and to our privacies as individuals.

The government and ISPs should be transparent and allow for participatory consultations in crafting the implementing guidelines for this new law.

Redundant laws

Also, there’s already a law that provides for special protection to children against exploitation of any kind, R.A. 7610 or the Special Protection of Children Against Abuse, Exploitation and Discrimination Act. Perhaps our lawmakers should’ve amended it instead with the provisions of R.A. 9775 to cover the context of fast production and distribution of child pornography materials via the Internet and mobile phones so prevalent today.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m totally in favor of this new law and I am against child pornography, but any good law becomes a bad one when the implementation becomes a way to trample upon the rights of others.

The need to improve my handwriting

jhay — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 00:31:27 +0000

To those who know me personally and to a certain extent, my online friends (aka bloggers) I’ve always been a writer. Or someone with a gift of wielding the pen more powerfully than a sword. It began in high school when I’ve been consistently recognized for my essays and scripts.

However, unknown to most, save for my school mates and teachers, both past and present, I’m a writer with a terrible penmanship. In Filipino we call it “kinalahig ng manok” or chicken scratchings. That’s why when I was still in my pre-med course, everyone who caught a sight of my handwriting agreed that indeed, I have the makings of being a medical doctor, another one to wreak havoc on the eye-sights of pharmacists and would-be patients. Alas that will now never come to be cause I’ve switched over to my pre-law course and I’m hell-bent on finishing it.

And it’s become a worrying thing for me because as the title suggests, I really need to improve my penmanship. Two occasions have now convinced me of this.

I really need to improve my penmanship

The first one, was during my first meeting with my professor in my Essay & Essay Writing class last Thursday morning. She seemed to be a nice person and some one who really knows what she’s teaching. Any ways the first exercise she made us do was a quick writing exercise wherein we’d think of an object that best describes ourselves. It’s boring for some, but it’s way better than the usual routine done during the first day of classes where we’d stand one by one and introduce our selves to the class for the purpose of getting to know one another.

I’ll share what I wrote for that exercise once our professor returns our papers but since I was the first one to finish writing, my quick essay was the first one to be read. So anxiously, I waited for her reaction. A smile was always a good sign and she did give me one while noting to the class that she had found someone who’s good at writing. (Thank you!)

Shortly, she approached me and said something that inspired this post, the piece was excellent with only a few minor fixes to improve it more, however, the one crucial detail I must really work on is, you’ve guessed it, improving my handwriting.

She drove home the point when she shared that in essay writing contests, in which she had been a judge on several occasions, really good essays have lost because of poor penmanship. I’d argue that it’s the substance of the work that matters but who could blame them? Even I sometimes have trouble reading my own handwriting. So point is well taken.

The second reminder happened during my Intro to Political Science class. My professor was the infamous Sir Atienza who’s been known to really lay down the rules in his classes and at this early in our pre-Law studies, emphasize the need to seriously prepare for Law school.

One of the rules he laid down, was the to use only black ink-pens and write in script or cursive form, as this is the same requirement for Law school. That was easy enough, I thought. Then again the third component of this rule was what really got to me, we need to write legibly.

So, would my terrible handwriting ruin my career in writing and prevent me from getting being a Lawyer someday? Looking at its current form, I really need to work hard on improving it.

Nicole has left the country

jhay — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 14:34:17 +0000

WTF?! Nicole has left this country and will stay in the US “for good“. Not poetic justice but some sick twist of irony. So much for the symbol of US military oppression and abuse, so much for the revival of the patriotic movement to junk the Visiting Forces Agreement and exact justice not just for the Filipina but also for the motherland.

One cannot help but get suspicions that the governments both our own and the United States’ have had a hand in this. Not so long ago, at the height of her legal battle against her rapist US Marine Daniel Smith, she and her family stood up against the portion of the public that opined that she would either succumb to lure of a bountiful settlement or give up on the country’s legendary justice system – or both.

She won, the US Marine was convicted but justice fell short when he remained in the custody of the United States through his stay at the US Embassy. Still, the struggle continued, gained momentum and even support from some senators (be it for their own election-related interests or not) and is about to blossom until this. She and her family has become:

tired of the case and do not want anymore to be bothered by it because ‘there is no justice in the Philippines.’”

It’s not only her lawyer that has been left hanging in the air, but also the national movement that has picked up her cause and is now ready to mount a struggle to the end.

Should this setback, a slap on the face, be enough to give up all together?

I believe it should not. There’s a grain of bitter truth on The Warrior Lawyer’s conclusion;

Every Filipina has a price. And that price is, sadly, a one-way ticket to the U.S.

However, Nicole’s lawyer, Evelyn Ursua has perfectly said the otherwise;

“While I have ceased to be Nicole’s lawyer, I, as a citizen who loves this country, remain committed to the cause of obtaining justice in Nicole’s case and putting an end to the iniquitous Visiting Forces Agreement,”

“The ‘Nicole’ that and the other lawyers represented was beyond the woman that Nicole and her family thought she was. ‘Nicole’ is every Filipino woman who was and will be raped by American soldiers. ‘Nicole’ can happen again. And so the fight against the Visiting Forces Agreement (VFA) and the presence of US troops in the country must continue,”

When Jose Rizal refused to give his blessings to the Revolution and chose to stay in exile in Dapitan, Bonifacio and the Katipunan pushed on with it regardless. Though there were many setbacks, long battles and even the betrayal of their comrades, the Revolution succeeded in gaining our independence from Spain.

This in turn was cut short by the arrival of the Americans and we have never fully recovered from then on, a hundred years later we’re still recovering from chains and strings of Uncle Sam. Perhaps this time around, despite the spoiling departure of Nicole (some would construe as betrayal, but I wouldn’t go there), we’d finish what our forefathers have started.