A REGIONAL trial court judge in Roxas City, Mindoro Oriental has been dismissed from the judiciary and barred by the Supreme Court (SC) from working in any branch of the government after he was found guilty of soliciting bribes from lawyers, litigants, and even local elective officials in exchange for favorable decisions and actions.
In a decision promulgated on October 10, 2023 but made public only last March 1, the SC en banc found former Presiding Judge Edralin Reyes of RTC Branch 43 of Roxas City, Oriental Mindoro guilty of gross misconduct for violating the New Code of Judicial Conduct.
Aside from dismissing him from service, the High Court also ordered his perpetual disqualification from re-employment in any branch or agency of the government, including government-owned or controlled corporations, and the forfeiture of his retirement and other benefits, except accrued leave credits.
Reyes was also ordered to pay a P17,500 fine for simple misconduct for his negligence in supervising his court staff and ensuring a proper and safe record and evidence-keeping system in his court, resulting in missing firearms, exhibits, and pieces of evidence that were in court custody.
Court records showed that in August 2018, the SC assigned a laptop to Reyes, then acting Presiding Judge of Branch 39, RTC of Roxas City, which he can use in drafting his decisions and other work-related duties.
The said laptop was turned over to Judge Josephine Carranzo when she was appointed to Branch 39.
In December 2019, Carranzo returned the laptop to the SC’s Management Information Systems Office (MISO) for repair or replacement.
The SC said as per standard procedure, the MISO examined the laptop and found a backup of iPhone messages, some of which showed that Reyes was engaged in corrupt practice.
The MISO then reported what it found in the laptop to the Office of the Court Administrator (OCA), which hired a forensic expert to extract data from the personal computer.
The forensic examination resulted in the recovery of SMS/iMessage conversations, contact information, photos, videos, and iPhone notes.
The OCA investigating team determined that Reyes was the user of the laptop and the owners of an iPhone 6S Plus from which the iMessages came.
The SC said the probe showed that Reyes used the said phone to communicate and ask for bribes from several lawyers and private individuals, in exchange for favorable action on cases pending before him.
“It became apparent that Reyes frequently conversed with Atty. Eduardo Magsino, Atty. Marlo Masangkay, Atty. Lysander Lascano Fetizanan, and Mayor Joselito Malabanan.
Specifically, Reyes borrowed money and asked for ‘pabaon’ or pocket money from Atty. Magsino whenever Reyes attended seminars and trainings; he asked Atty. Masangkay to be his ‘dummy’ in a transaction involving a 900-square-meter lot that Reyes owns; and he received money, a car, and guns from private practitioners in exchange for favorable action,” the SC said.
A subsequent audit also confirmed that Reyes demanded and asked for bribes in exchange for orders or resolutions granting bail or its reduction, decisions of acquittal, orders granting motion to travel abroad, and orders allowing plea to a lesser offense.
The audit likewise revealed that the firearms in nine cases decided by Reyes involving violations of the Comprehensive Firearms and Ammunitions Act were not turned over to the Philippine National Police.
“The judicial audit teams surmised that Reyes and the lawyers he frequently conversed with may have kept the missing firearms after the cases were dismissed,” the SC added.
In defense, Reyes argued that the retrieval of his private mobile phone data from the laptop was “a brazen violation of his constitutional right to privacy of correspondence.”
He also claimed that the messages recovered from his mobile phone were fake, altered, tampered with, and unreliable, saying it was Carranzo, who allegedly has an axe to grind against him, was in possession of the phone before it was turned over to the MISO.
He likewise said that the messages recovered from his laptop cannot be used because they were obtained in his absence and without his permission.
But the SC junked his arguments, noting that a government-issued computer, even if privately controlled, is subject to regulation and monitoring by the government employer.
The SC further held that the SMS/iMessage exchanges and the findings of the audit team were not excludable as there was no violation of Reyes’ right to privacy.
The court also stressed that laptops and computers are provided to judges and court employees to facilitate the courts’ function of adjudicating cases and are not meant for private purposes.
“In Reyes’ case, the SMS/iMessage correspondence were stored in the subject laptop and not in his private computer. Neither did it appear that the laptop was forcibly taken from him,” the SC said.
It added that since there is no violation of Reyes’ right to privacy, the information obtained through the judicial audit cannot be considered “fruit of the poisonous tree.”
“Even if the Court considered the MISO and OCA’s retrieval of the iPhone messages as violation of Judge Reyes’s right to privacy, this Court finds that the information obtained by the judicial audit team should be treated as an exception, as it is an inevitable discovery,” the SC held.
“Indeed, an administrative investigation would have been conducted, and the judicial audit team would have found the incriminating information even without the SMS/iMessage exchanges from the laptop. Thus, in the natural course of events, the evidence and information contained in the judicial audit team report would have reached this Court,” the SC concluded.
