GMA appoints ex-Makati judge as Sandigan justice

MANILA, Philippines – President Arroyo has appointed former Makati City Regional Trial Court judge Napoleon Inoturan as Sandiganbayan associate justice, replacing Godofredo Legaspi who retired in November last year.

Press Secretary Ignacio Bunye said Mrs. Arroyo signed the appointment papers last Friday.

“As former solicitor at the Solicitor General’s Office, he defended the constitutionality of the Philippine National Police Law and the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program law when questioned before the Supreme Court,” Bunye said, citing Inoturan’s credentials.

Before his appointment, Inoturan, 59, was judge of Branch 133 of the Makati City RTC, a post that he had held since July 1994. He also became the judge of Branch 60 of the Lucena City RTC.

He was a trial attorney of the Office of the Solicitor General from 1977 to 1982 and then promoted to Solicitor in 1982 until 1991.

Inoturan took up law at the University of the Philippines in 1972 after graduating from the De La Salle University with a Bachelor of Arts in Economics in 1971.

He also had his secondary and elementary education in DLSU where he graduated fourth in his batch in high school and valedictorian in elementary.

Among the seminars he took were on extrajudicial killings and forced disappearances spearheaded by Chief Justice Reynato Puno in May 2007 and the Seminar on Election Laws for Judges and Clerks of Court organized by the Supreme Court that same month.

He was born in Manila July 27, 1948 and is married to lawyer Nimfa Inoturan. They have five children. – Paolo Romero