A.M. No. 10-7-17-SC - IN RE: Del Castillo

Case Summary (A.M. No. 10-7-17-SC)

Key Dates

• 1998–2010: Petitioners’ attempts to have the Executive Department espouse their claims against Japan.
• April 28, 2010: Supreme Court en banc issues the Vinuya decision dismissing petitioners’ petition.
• June 9, 2010: Petitioners move for reconsideration.
• July 18–19, 2010: Counsel Roque announces and files supplemental motion alleging plagiarism.
• July 27, 2010: En banc refers plagiarism charges against Justice del Castillo to its Ethics Committee.
• August 2–26, 2010: Committee proceedings, including written comments, presentation of evidence, and an evidentiary hearing.
• October 15, 2010: Supreme Court en banc issues its decision on the ethics charges.

Applicable Law

• 1987 Philippine Constitution (post-1990 decision date) governing separation of powers and the Executive’s exclusive prerogative to determine foreign claims.
• Webster’s New World College Dictionary definition of plagiarism.
• Academic standards on plagiarism (University of the Philippines Board of Regents v. Court of Appeals and Arokiaswamy).
• Judicial ethical rules and Supreme Court precedents on misconduct and discipline of justices.

Background of the Vinuya Litigation

Petitioners filed G.R. No. 162230, a special civil action of certiorari with preliminary mandatory injunction, against the Executive Secretary, the Secretaries of Foreign Affairs and Justice, and the Solicitor General. They alleged that wartime Japanese forces systematically raped Filipino women (“comfort women”) and that the Executive Department’s refusal to espouse their individual claims violated their rights. The Court dismissed the petition mainly because (1) the Constitution vests the Executive with exclusive authority to espouse foreign claims and (2) international law imposes no obligation on the Philippines to do so.

Supplemental Motion and Allegations of Plagiarism

After the initial denial of reconsideration, petitioners filed a supplemental motion asserting that Justice del Castillo plagiarized extensive passages from three foreign works—Criddle & Fox-Desent (Yale Journal of International Law, 2009), Ellis (Case Western Reserve Journal of International Law, 2006), and Tams (Cambridge University Press, 2005)—and twisted their meanings to support the Vinuya decision.

Referral to the Ethics Committee and Investigation

On July 27, 2010, the Court en banc referred the plagiarism and twisting charges to its Ethics and Ethical Standards Committee, chaired by the Chief Justice and assisted by retired Justice Jose C. Vitug. The Committee received pleadings, heard oral arguments on August 26, and reviewed exhibits, including the researcher’s demonstration that source attributions had appeared in early drafts but were accidentally deleted during editing.

Issues for Determination

Did Justice del Castillo plagiarize the works of Tams, Criddle & Fox-Desent, and Ellis in the Vinuya decision?
Did he distort (“twist”) the authors’ intended meanings to bolster the Court’s reasoning?

Definition and Essential Element of Plagiarism

The Court adopted Webster’s definition: plagiarism is the taking of another’s ideas or language and passing them off as one’s own. The indispensable element is the “passing off” of borrowed material without adequate attribution.

Analysis of Tams Passages

The Vinuya decision’s Footnote 69 cited Tams’s work, albeit generically (“See Tams, Enforcing Obligations Erga Omnes in International Law (2005)”), alongside Bruno Simma’s commentary. The Court found that the reference, though imprecise, negated any claim that those passages were presented as del Castillo’s original work.

Analysis of Ellis and Criddle & Fox-Desent Passages

The extensive verbatim passages lifted from Ellis (adjudicated in Footnote 65) and Criddle & Fox-Desent (text and multiple footnotes on pages 30–32) lacked quotation marks and full author attribution. The Committee established that a court researcher had included proper attributions in the early drafts but inadvertently deleted them while pruning and reorganizing the manuscript in Microsoft Word. Given the volume of citations (119 footnotes), the accidental removal of two attributions was deemed plausible.

First Finding: Credibility of the Researcher’s Explanation

The Court adopted the Committee’s unanimous conclusion that the researcher’s account of inadvertent deletion was credible. The technical operations of the Word program and the standard cut-and-paste research method supported the possibility of unintentional removal of source markers.

Second Finding: No Intent to Pass Off as One’s Own

Although quotation marks were omitted, the remaining footnotes still pointed to original sources (e.g., Von Tuhr and Valverde for the Tams passages). The Court held that del Castillo did not seek to present the borrowed material as his own, thereby distinguishing editing errors from “manifest intellectual theft.”

Third Finding: No Twisting of Source Meanings

The Court rejected the twisting allegation as baseless. The passages supplied neutral background on the development of international legal norms; readers could not reasonably infer that the Court attributed those scholars’ views to its conclusion on the Executive’s prerogativ

Case Syllabus (A.M. No. 10-7-17-SC)

Background of the Vinuya Case

Petitioners Isabelita C. Vinuya and approximately 70 elderly women (the Malaya Lolas Organization) filed G.R. No. 162230, a special civil action for certiorari with preliminary mandatory injunction.
Respondents were the Executive Secretary, Secretary of Foreign Affairs, Secretary of Justice, and the Office of the Solicitor General.
Petitioners alleged that during World War II Japanese forces systematically raped and enslaved them in “comfort women” stations; they sought official apology and reparations from Japan.
The Executive Department declined to espouse their claims, citing satisfaction under the Peace Treaty between the Philippines and Japan.
On April 28, 2010, the Supreme Court, through Justice Mariano C. del Castillo, dismissed the petition on two grounds:
- The exclusive prerogative of the Executive Department to determine whether to espouse claims against foreign states.
- The absence of any international law obligation for the Philippines to espouse individual claims of wartime sexual slavery.

Supplemental Motion for Reconsideration and Plagiarism Allegations

Petitioners filed a motion for reconsideration on June 9, 2010; no suspensive effect was granted.
On July 18, 2010, Atty. Herminio Harry Roque, Jr. publicly announced plans to allege plagiarism in the Court’s second ground.
On July 19, 2010, petitioners filed a supplemental motion charging Justice del Castillo with:
- “Manifest intellectual theft and outright plagiarism” of passages from three foreign sources: • Evan J. Criddle & Evan Fox-Descente, “A Fiduciary Theory of Jus Cogens,” Yale Journal of International Law (2009)
  • Mark Ellis, “Breaking the Silence: Rape as an International Crime,” Case Western Reserve Journal of International Law (2006)
  • Christian J. Tams, Enforcing Erga Omnes Obligations in International Law (Cambridge, 2005)
- Twisting the original meaning of those passages to support the Court’s conclusions.
Petitioners contended that these acts undermined the integrity of the Court’s deliberations and deprived them of relief.

Referral to the Committee on Ethics and Ethical Standards

On July 27, 2010, the Court en banc referred the charges against Justice del Castillo to its Committee on Ethics and Ethical Standards, chaired by the Chief Justice.
Retired Justice Jose C. Vitug was designated consultant to the Committee.
The Committee directed petitioners to comment on Justice del Castillo’s verified letter (July 22, 2010) in which he:
- Denied malicious intent and affirmed his intent to attribute all sources.
- Described the multiple en banc deliberations and revisions of his draft.
Petitioners submitted their comments; th