OFFICE OF THE COURT ADMINISTRATOR, COMPLAINANT, VS. JUDGE RODRIGO B. LORENZO, RTC, BRANCH 266, PASIG CITY.

Ruling

Accordingly, administrative cases leveled against judges must always be examined with a discriminating eye, for their consequential effects are, by their nature, highly penal, such that judges stand to face the sanction of dismissal and/or disbarment. In sum, we find the published articles attributing acts of dishonesty and corruption to respondent judge to be without basis. Nonetheless, we agree with the conclusion of the Investigating Justice that respondent judge, in ordering the release on bail of the accused Chinese nationals, committed several serious lapses in disregard of legal and procedural rules. To start off, respondent judge allowed the accused to post bail supposedly because of the prosecution's inability to prove their guilt with strong evidence. But as aptly observed by the Investigating Justice, respondent judge's decision "would have been correct, if only [he] paid enough attention to the factors why the prosecution had not yet established that the evidence of guilt is strong," [14] referring to the non-appearance during the April 4, 5, and 11, 2002 bail hearings of two key prosecution witnesses, the PNP forensic chemist, Police Inspector Sumobay; and the head of the raiding team, Police Senior Inspector Insp. Napoleon Villegas. As observed further, Sumobay's testimony would have proved not only the amount of shabu seized, but more importantly that the substance examined was shabu. The records tend to show that five kilos of shabu were confiscated. Given the foregoing consideration, the Court is at a loss to understand why the respondent judge did not even bother to look into the reasons for the non-appearance of Sumobay and Villegas during the first three hearings scheduled for the petition for bail; and why Sumobay did not answer the bench warrant issued when she failed to appear in the initial hearings. If respondent did, he would have discovered that Villegas was on an official mission abroad during the petition for bail hearings; as for Sumobay, she failed to appear simply because she never received a subpoena. The investigating report details the circumstances behind her non-appearance, thus: When P/Insp. Sumobay was called to testify during the investigation, she claimed that she did not receive any subpoena, allegedly served by the court. It turned out that the subpoena intended for her was served to a certain PO3 Elizabeth Villa of the ADOT Training Division, an office different from her office. x x x Sumobay's office has its own receiving section and subpoena clerks x x x. P/Insp. Sumobay, upon learning of the subpoena and bench warrants against her from her co-chemist, went to Branch 266 to verify the information that she was supposed to appear and testify on April 11, 2002. She even checked from the records of the court who received the subpoena for her. She took the time to verify the identity of one PO3 Villa x x x. She attended and testified during the April 18, 2002 hearing which was previously scheduled for the