Brother of dismissed Sandiganbayan justice named to Court of Appeals

President Rodrigo Duterte has appointed to the Court of Appeals (CA) the brother of former Sandiganbayan Justice Gregory Ong, who was dismissed in 2014 for links to alleged pork barrel scam mastermind Janet Napoles.

Lawyer Walter Ong was named on November 28 to replace then CA justice and now SC magistrate Noel Tijam, according to the transmittal letter from Malacañang that was received by the office of Chief Justice Maria Lourdes Sereno on Monday.

Prior to his appointment, Walter Ong had also been shortlisted by the Judicial and Bar Council (JBC) for the post left by the late Sandiganbayan Associate Justice Maria Cristina Cornejo.

Ong’s brother, Gregory Ong, was axed by the Supreme Court (SC) in September 2014 following allegations that he helped Napoles escape jail time for the delivery of poor Kevlar helmets for soldiers in 1998.

No concrete proof was shown in the course of the investigation conducted by retired SC justice Angelina Sandoval Gutierrez that money changed hands for Napoles’ acquittal in the malversation case before the Sandiganbayan Fourth Division in 2010. 

But the former magistrate’s visits to Napoles in 2012 and his presence in at least one party where he was photographed with her led the SC to believe that he had extended favors to the businesswoman and her relatives in the Kevlar helmet case.

The SC said it could not consider Gregory Ong's misconduct as being "simple because his association with Napoles had dragged the judiciary into the pork barrel controversy which initially involved only legislative and executive officials." —NB, GMA News