LAWYER and former Palace spokesperson Rose Beatrix “Trixie” Cruz-Angeles has been suspended by the Supreme Court for six months for violating the old Code of Professional Responsibility that governs the conduct of lawyers in the country before it was replaced recently by the Code of Professional Responsibility and Accountability.
In a decision promulgated by the SC’s Third Division on March 27 but only uploaded last July 18, the High Court also found Angeles and another respondent, lawyer Ahmed Paglinawan, guilty of violating Rule 8.01, Canon 8 of the old lawyers’ code of conduct.
“The Court suspends Atty. Rose Beatrix Cruz-Angeles from the practice of law for six months effective upon her receipt of this Resolution, and reprimands Atty. Ahmed G. Paglinawan. They are, likewise, sternly warned that a repetition of the same or similar act in the future will be dealt with more sternly,” the SC said.
The SC said Cruz-Angeles and Paglinawan used “language, which are grossly abusive and offensive, which are not befitting the dignity of the legal profession” in a pleading she and her co-counsel had filed before the Quezon City Metropolitan Trial Court.
Complainant lawyer Roderick Manzano had asked the SC in May 2016 to disbar Cruz-Angeles and Paglinawan for violating the lawyer’s code with their intemperate language in the pleading.
Upon receipt of the complaint, the SC referred it to the Commission on Integrity and Bar Discipline of the Integrated Bar of the Philippines for investigation and recommendation.
In July 2018, the IBP recommended the suspension of the respondents for six months.
A subsequent motion for reconsideration was rejected by the IBP but it the penalty imposed on Paglinawan.
The SC said the intemperate language used by the respondents cannot be considered as pertinent to the unlawful detainer case and were made for the purpose of “insulting, dishonoring and humiliating” the complainants in the case.
In 2016, the SC also suspended Cruz-Angeles for three years for being remiss in her duties over a complaint filed in 2003 by Magdalo officer Capt. Cleo Dongga-as.
Dongga-as said he engaged Cruz-Angeles in the annulment of her marriage and paid P350,000 for her services but she and her co-counsel, Wylie Paner, failed to “produce a petition for annulment.”
