The Supreme Court in a recent en banc resolution found a Bacolod Regional Trial Court judge guilty of “vulgar and unbecoming conduct” and fined him P5,000, with a warning that a repetition of a similar offense in the future will be dealt with more severely.

The en banc resolution promulgated Oct. 19 was based on complaints filed by lawyers Rowena Guanzon and Pearl Montesino of the Gender Watch Coalition, former Assistant City Prosecutor Rosanna Saril-Toledano and lawyer Erfe del Castillo Caldit against Judge Anastacio Rufon of Bacolod RTC Branch 52.

On Feb. 11, 2005 they filed a complaint letter against Rufon for “violations of the Code of Judicial Conduct and the Rule on Gender-Fair Language, use of foul, or obscene and discriminatory language, discrimination against women lawyers and litigants and unethical conduct.”

Complainant Caldit later executed a letter withdrawing her complaint against respondent.

In his comment dated Jan. 20, 2006 , Rufon vehemently denied the charges.

On March 14, 2006 , the SC referred the case to Justice Rebecca De Guia-Salvador of the Court of Appeals for investigation and recommendation.

In view of the parties' failure to attend the proceedings, Salvador resolved the case on the bases of the pleadings and documents they filed, the SC decision said.

A careful scrutiny of the record shows sufficient ground for a reprimand and an admonition to Rufon to act with utmost temperance, sensitivity and circumspection in the discharge of his functions, Salvador said in her report to the SC.

Salvador said Cynthia Bagtas-Serios in an affidavit gave the following account of Rufon's deportment that goes into the heart of the complaint.

Bagtos-Serios said she was shocked when Rufon, during one of the hearings of her case inside the court with many people present told her: “next time you see your husband, open your arms and legs.”

I felt humiliated and insulted, Bagtos-Serios was quoted as saying.

Rufon should bear in mind that a judge holds a position in the community that is looked up to with honor and privilege, Salvador said.

Although judges are subject to human limitations, it cannot be over-emphasized that no position is more demanding as regards moral righteousness and uprightness of any individual than a seat on the Bench, she added.

Salvador recommended that Rufon be reprimanded with a “stern admonition that he should, henceforth, take care to act with utmost temperance, sensitivity and circumspection in the discharge of his functions.”

The SC, in its en banc decision sustained the findings of Salvador that Rufon uttered in open court intemperate and obscene language injurious to the sensitivity and feelings of complainants who are all women.

“Judicial decorum requires a magistrate to be at all times temperate in his language, refraining from inflammatory or excessive rhetoric or from resorting ‘to language of vilification',” the SC ruled.

Although Rufon may attribute his intemperate language to human frailty, his position in the bench demands from him courteous speech in and out of the court, the SC ruled.

The SC ruling was penned by Associate Justice Angelina Sandoval-Gutierrez, and concurred by Chief Justice Reynato Puno, Associate Justices Leonardo Quisumbing, Antonio Carpio, Renato Corona, Consuelo Ynarez-Santiago, Ma. Alicio Austria-Martinez, Conchita Carpio Morales, Adolfo Azcuna, Minita Chico-Nazario, Presbitero Velasco Jr., Ruben Reyes, Dante Tinga, Cancio Garcia and Antonio Eduardo Nachura.*CPG

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