Sentenced to death

Just when things were beginning to look good for this country with the economy moving, the peso appreciating and hopefully some positive political changes happening, we get a big kick in the stomach with the brutal killing of Judge Henrick Gingoyon by motorcycle-riding gunmen in Cavite. This is not just a simple, ordinary kind of murder. A judge who is supposed to render justice has been treated with grave injustice. And when it is a judge that gets killed, crime takes on a different level. People are taking it to mean the breakdown of law and order in this country. It is like a signal for all hell to break loose. There is a possibility that the international community will once again tag the Philippines as a country of criminals.

Judge Gingoyon’s daughter, Beth, happened to work for us in the past. She told us that she believed the attack on her father was not personal because he was a really straight guy who was well loved by the people who knew him and worked with him. He was well-respected by his peers, especially Cebuanos whom he helped in the early days of his career as a lawyer fighting for human rights and giving legal assistance to the poor. He has also earned a reputation for being very careful about his decisions. Judge Gingoyon’s decisions were rarely overturned because he studied the merits of a case scrupulously.

While the family was quite aware of the death threats, the judge didn’t discuss it with them. "My dad keeps his work away from our home. Although we know what the danger was, he never discussed the details," Beth said. Like many RTC judges in this country, Judge Gingoyon has handled cases that involved illegal drugs and other dangerous issues. It’s not unlikely that in the process, he might have earned the ire of gangsters, notorious characters and unscrupulous individuals – who then "sentenced the judge to death."

Beth said their family knew the hazards of his job, but the judge didn’t want his family to worry. That’s probably why the judge encouraged her and a sister to go abroad, ostensibly to explore opportunities outside the country. But the real reason may have been to keep them away from the dangers that went with his job because, as she herself told us, Judge Gingoyon was a protective father.

The grief has not yet fully settled in for the Gingoyon family, but Beth knows that the mourning and the grieving will start after the judge is finally laid to rest in Cebu, and when all the visitors have left. "When everything goes back to normal – if ever it goes back to normal – our dad will no longer be around." The sad part is, even if the authorities manage to get the criminals behind this dastardly act, it will never bring back their father.

Judge Gingoyon’s gangland-style execution is similar to the Mafia style of gunning down their enemies on the streets in pleno publico. And Cavite, where the killing took place, happens to be a province known for having warlords, smuggling syndicates, and guns for hire where guns are used to end conflicts for good – or for bad, depending on which side you’re on. Coupled with recent reports of hijacking, smuggling and the much publicized busting of the "mother of all shabu labs" two years ago, Cavite is once again beginning to have that notorious reputation as a "hotspot" like the good ol’ days of known smuggler Lino Bocalan.

Judge Gingoyon’s murder brings the number of judges that have been murdered since 1999 to 11. In 2004, three RTC judges were killed, among them Voltaire Rosales who was also shot by motorcycle-riding gunmen in Tanauan, Batangas. As far as people know, nothing has yet come out of the investigation to date. What happened to Judge Gingoyon and to 56 practicing journalists – which is another story altogether – who have been killed in the last five years just as mercilessly and brutally should be condemned and dealt with in the strongest possible terms.

We have to stop listening to all these European countries and "bleeding heart" organizations insisting that we should scrap the death sentence.

Unfortunately, this is a country where we have a very strong Latin or Italian influence in our blood that we tend to solve disputes with the barrel of a gun.

In Thailand, they have a different way of dealing with drug smugglers – they just get rid of them like the 3,000 that were shot to death. In Singapore, the government did not relent no matter how much pressure and condemnation they got from the Australians when they gave the death sentence to 25-year-old Vietnamese-Australian Tuong Van Nguyen for drug smuggling. They hanged him. These are examples of how we must have that strong political resolve to carry out the law without hesitation. We keep on commuting the death sentence, giving endless reprieves to convicted criminals on death row.

The NBI and the PNP have arrested several suspects in the slaying, but the real mastermind has yet to be tagged. We must not let those criminals get away with this one. Otherwise, no amount of prosperity can make up for the reputation that this country will get – that judges get the death sentence and criminals who are sentenced get a reprieve.

Judge Gingoyon was sentenced to death without trial by these gangsters, and these criminals pushed through with it without any delay or hesitation. If these criminals can do it, then we have to do the same. If a criminal is convicted and sentenced to death, then the punishment should be meted out – without any hesitation or delay. As the writer Joseph Addison once wrote, "He who hesitates – is lost forever." The more we hesitate in executing criminals, the more likely we will lose the war on crime.

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