2 women take center stage in Maguindanao massacre

MANLA – Two women lawyers have taken center stage because they accepted a “dangerous assignment” arising from the massacre of 57 people in Maguindanao province in Mindanao, which at least one of their male colleagues had refused to handle for fear of his life.

They are Judge Jocelyn Solis-Reyes of the Regional Trial Court (RTC) of suburban Quezon City, Metro Manila and Senior State Prosecutor Roseanne Balauag of the Department of Justice.

Through a raffle, Reyes was assigned to try the multiple murder charges on 40 counts filed against Mayor Andal Ampatuan Jr. of Datu Unsay town in Maguindanao, the son and namesake of the patriarch of a powerful clan and the principal accused in the massacre.

Reyes got the assignment after RTC Judge Luisito Cortez also of Quezon City immediately refused to handle the case after it was raffled off to him, saying he feared for his life and that of the members of his family.

On the other hand, Balauag heads a five-member panel from the Department of Justice, composed of three male and two female state prosecutors, to conduct a preliminary hearing on the additional 17 murder charges filed by the police and the National Bureau of Investigation against Mayor Ampatuan and at least 200 others in connection with the massacre.

Among the victims in the November 23 massacre in Ampatuan town were the wife and two sisters and two women lawyers of the scion of a rival clan as well as 30 Mindanao-based journalists.

In sharp contrast to the attitude of Cortez, Reyes welcomed the assignment and even rejected the offer of the Philippine National Police (PNP) to provide her with a close-in security, saying there was still no threat to her life.

While accepting the assignment, Reyes has so far rejected requests for media interviews, saying she wanted to study carefully the details regarding the case assigned to her.

For her part, Balauag was more open to journalists during a press conference at the end of the preliminary hearing on Friday of the murder charges in which she met for the first time Mayor Ampatuan and the other massacre suspects.

When asked whether she feared for her life, Balauag, a state prosecutor for the past l5 years, answered: “I’m not afraid. Do I have a reason to be afraid?”

Reyes and Balauag graduated from the College of Law of the University of Santo Tomas in Manila, which is run by Catholic priests belonging to the Dominican order.

Malacanang was the latest to join in praising Reyes who described her as clearly more ready to face the risks compared to Cortez who had to beg off from the assignment.

Senate Majority Leader Juan Miguel Zubiri and opposition Senator Alan Peter Cayetano agreed that “the best man for the job was a woman,” referring to Reyes.

Meanwhile, Judge Luisito Cortez continued to reap scorn and denunciation for his refusal to handle the massacre case amid mounting demands for his resignation and to look for another job.

On Saturday, the Philippine Daily Inquirer, the country’s largest circulation daily, came out with an editorial, entitled “One gutsy lady,” which said: “Judge Jocelyn Solis-Reyes has shown that she has a lot of what a male colleague sorely lacks – courage to do one’s duty in the face of danger, real or imagined.”

“If all the judges thought like Cortez, the justice system would have broken down, and Ampatuan would soon be laughing all the way to freedom,” the editorial stressed. “The reason he may not is that there are still women of steel like Reyes who persevere in their duties without counting the inconveniences and dangers. Reyes saved the day for the judiciary by doing what she described as something ‘ordinary’.”

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