By Carlos H. Conde
International Herald Tribune
Published: February 4, 2008

MANILA: Jose Bernas considers himself extremely lucky. In May last year, two gunmen posing as journalists tried to kill him inside his office here. Bernas survived only because he had managed to block the path to his office; as he and the assailants struggled for control of the door, one of them fired his gun through it but missed Bernas.

The men fled, leaving behind the shaken but otherwise unscathed lawyer.

Gil Gojol was not as fortunate. A lawyer known for representing several victims of human-rights abuses, Gojol and his driver were shot and killed in Bicol, a region south of Manila, on Dec. 12. His colleagues believed the murders had something to do with a human-rights case Gojol was handling at the time.

The shootings of Bernas and Gojol were just two of the high-profile attacks on lawyers and judges in the Philippines in recent years. Last month, Roberto Navidad, a judge in a trial court in Calbayog City, in the central Philippines, was shot and killed.

Navidad was the 14th judge to have been slain since 2001, according to the records of the Supreme Court. According to the National Union of People’s Lawyers, 26 lawyers have been assassinated since 2001, with 7 of those deaths taking place last year.

The killings have become so daring that the judge hearing the case that Bernas had been working on was killed in 2005. The next year, the government lawyer prosecuting the same case was assassinated along with his son. No wonder Bernas, a well-off young corporate attorney, decided to leave the Philippines immediately after the attempt on his life. In an interview late last year, he called the incident “a most harrowing experience” that took its toll on him, his family and his practice.

Human-rights and lawyers’ groups use 2001 as a reference point for these killings, because it was the year President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo took power and, according to them, more killings have occurred during her administration than in any other since the era of the dictator Ferdinand Marcos. Nearly 900 activists, journalists, lawyers and judges have been killed since that year, according to Karapatan, a Malina-based human rights group, which says the attacks began to worsen in 2004.

The Arroyo administration has denied the allegation that it was behind the killings or that it was condoning them.

Nevertheless, the government has created a police task force to investigate the killings and, along with the Supreme Court, held a summit late last year to try to find solutions to the murders. “We are as concerned about these killings as everybody else and we are doing everything we can to bring the perpetrators to justice,” said Jefferson Soriano, commander of the task force.

The Supreme Court has taken steps to ensure that lawyers and judges are provided ample security. It has ordered more security personnel to be posted in the courts and has set up a system in which judges who receive death threats can immediately apply for protective security. It also abolished so-called heinous-crimes courts because a judge in such a court is easily identifiable and therefore vulnerable.

But on Jan. 29, a gunman slipped inside the court inside the Manila City Hall compound and killed a former town mayor. The assassin escaped, leaving behind what Dante Jimenez, founding chairman of the Volunteers Against Crime and Corruption, called an “unmistakable message – no one is safe, not even those who seek refuge in the courts.”

And just as the killings of activists undermine democracy in the Philippines, lawyers, judges and anti-crime groups also believe that the killings of judges and lawyers seriously undermine the criminal justice system here.

Also, because many of the victims were known to represent victims of human rights violations that are almost always blamed on state security forces, the killings are seen as a setback to the cause of human rights in the Philippines.

“These killings intimidate and threaten lawyers and judges. I can’t even begin to imagine what these can do to those who are tasked to dispense justice,” said Dante Jimenez, founding chairman of the Volunteers Against Crime and Corruption. “The fear these killings spread is no different from what the Mafia spread,” he said.

Jimenez said his group had studied the phenomenon and concluded that the prevalence of guns for hire in the Philippines, who kill for as little as $100 a contract, has worsened the situation.

“In at least two regions, we know that a criminal syndicate handles the killings of lawyers and judges,” Jimenez said.

And because of what Jimenez called a climate of fear, Filipinos “can expect a perversion of the justice system much worse than bribing a judge.”

In the Philippines, he said, “the gun trumps justice anytime.”

Neri Colmenares, executive director of the National Union of People’s Lawyers, agreed. “If the judge sees that you have the capacity to kill,” he said, “he would consider ruling in your favor whether he likes it or not.”

As a result of what Human Rights Watch called a “climate of impunity” in the Philippines, the judiciary has suffered serious credibility setbacks. In its report last year on the extrajudicial killings in the country, in which the killings of lawyers and judges were also studied, this impunity has deepened public distrust in the justice system.

“Witnesses and victims’ families interviewed by Human Rights Watch said they expect no real results from government investigations, and they predict impunity for those involved in the killings,” the report said.

An international fact-finding mission attended by Filipino and European lawyers last year found that “no killers of lawyers and judges have been convicted” and that the threat against lawyers and judges “makes their work completely impossible.”

Colmenares knows this only too well. Last year, he discovered that his name was on a list of alleged communists said to have carried out murders in a central Philippine province years ago. The list was prepared by a military witness in a case in which Colmenares was representing leftist activists accused of being armed insurgents.

“I did not attend hearings for fear of my life,” Colmenares said, “and for fear that if the supposed witness saw me, it would be easier for him to make up lies about me.”

Human Rights Watch, in its monitoring, has discovered cases of lawyers representing activists who were sent threatening letters by courier.

Colmenares said that these threats directed against human-rights lawyers tend to discourage them from representing clients perceived by the governments as leftists. “This is a tragedy because we have seen an improvement in public-interest lawyering since the fall of the Marcos dictatorship,” he said. “With all these killings and threats, we fear that those who cannot afford lawyers or those who become victims of abuses will become even more marginalized and victimized.”