The Court of Appeals has sustained the decision of the Office of the Ombudsman prohibiting former Presidential Commission on Good Government Chairman Camilo Sabio from holding public office and forfeiting all his retirement benefits after finding him guilty of grave misconduct.
Sabio was stripped of his benefits and banned from public service for trying to influence his brother, then a magistrate in the Court of Appeals, in connection with an ownership dispute at the Manila Electric Co. in 2008.
The Court of Appeals’ Thirteenth Division, through Associate Justice Sesinando Villon, denied the petition for review filed by Sabio seeking the nullification of the decision rendered by the Ombudsman on Oct. 25, 2011 which found him guilty of grave misconduct and conduct prejudicial to the best interest of the service.
“A public servant must exhibit at all times the highest sense of honesty and integrity not only in the performance of his official duties but also in his personal and private dealings with other people,” the court said.
Court records showed that the former PCGG chief called his younger brother, then Associate Justice Jose Sabio Jr., to inform him that he had been named third member of the division, to which the Meralco-Government Service Insurance System ownership case had been raffled.
Sabio also informed his brother that a temporary restraining order had been prepared and tried to convince him of the validity of the stand of the GSIS and the Securities and Exchange Commission in the case.
“A judicious reading of the assailed decision of the Ombudsman would show that the same was legally justified, being supported by competent evidence on record and was not rendered in a capricious or whimsical exercise of judgment,” the CA ruled.
Associate Justices Rodil Zalameda and Pedro Corales concurred with the ruling.
The Meralco-GSIS dispute led to the dismissal from the service of Associate Justice Vicente Roxas for multiple violations of the Code of Judicial Conduct, grave misconduct, dishonesty, undue interest and conduct prejudicial to the best interest of the service in connection with his July 23, 2008 decision upholding the control of the Lopez bloc in Meralco.
The Supreme Court also found Justice Sabio guilty of misconduct and conduct unbecoming of a justice and was suspended for two months without pay.
The high court also reprimanded then Presiding Justice Conrado Vasquez Jr. for his failure to act promptly and decisively in order to avert the controversy, which damaged the reputation of the judiciary.