Commentary: On SC clears Justice Mariano del Castillo in plagiarism charges by some U.P. Law Faculty

By Chanda Shahani

The Supreme Court has cleared Justice Mariano del Castillo of bad faith in the issue of judicial plagiarism charges levied against him by several faculty of the U.P. College of Law, some of whom hold ranking positions within the U.P. System. In a rebuke to some of the faculty, the Supreme Court acknowledged sloppy workmanship of one of the Justice's researchers and the technical limitations of MS Word to detect cut-and-pasted portions of the decision. But the Supreme Court also criticized the protest letter of the faculty, saying that it was made to appear that more faculty had actually signed the letter than actually did; impliedly asserting misrepresentation on the part of some of the faculty, that a majority of the faculty of the U.P. College of Law had signed the actual document.

Perhaps the Supreme Court may wish to consider going beyond MS Word and purchasing off-the-shelf anti-plagiarism software such as Viper, which are now being used overseas to detect plagiarism. In our case, the Diliman Diary reasserts its previous position supporting the faculty of the Ateneo Law School who said that it was premature for Justice del Castillo to even consider resigning over this issue pending the release of the Supreme Court's investigation. Now that the investigation has cleared Justice Castillo, we note that there is now additional data strengthening our suspicion that those who go on the attack are themselves vulnerable to attack (please see: http://diliman-diary.blogspot.com/2010/09/7.html), as the documents they submitted questioning Justice del Castilo's professionalism very unprofessionally made it appear that there was an overwhelming number of signatories from the U.P. College of Law Faculty on their side, as was made abudantly clear by the Supreme Court. To read about this, please click on this link:
SC clears Justice Mariano del Castillo in plagiarism mess - Nation - GMANews.TV - Official Website of GMA News and Public Affairs - Latest Philippine News

Now that the Supreme Court findings are out, we are now hugely motivated to start to screen recent court decisions favoring the U.P. Administration by running the U.P. Administration's arguments, opposing arguments and corresponding judicial decisions (soft copies of course) through the Viper software to see if some of the same signatories of the missive criticizing Justice del Castillo should not themselves be impliedly rebuked if it can be ascertained that the justice's "plagiarized" the U.P. Administration's arguments, lock-stock-and-barrel. After all, what would motivate a researcher of a judge or Justice, or even the judge or Justice to lift entire paragraphs from the arguments of only one opposing side? MS Word cannot detect plagiarism. The Viper software can detect plagiarism but it cannot make any conclusions about the dark side of the human psyche that may occasionally prevail over the ideal that justice should be blind. It is only the vigilance of concerned citizens, media, bloggers and other parties who can monitor these developments. The problem of jettisoned Honor by those from U.P. was recently and brilliantly alluded to by no less than U.P. School of Economics Professor Solita C. Monsod (please see: http://diliman-diary.blogspot.com/2010/10/up-diliman-school-of-economics.html).

We are not questioning the right of the U.P. Administration to file cases or defend itself from suits, but as a community blog covering the Diliman area, of which the U.P. Administration is very much an inhabitant of, we wish to make sure that U.P. does not betray its own self-stated ideals of Honor and Excellence in fighting its legal fights. And at the end of the day, what is so wrong with that?

(Chanda Shahani is the Editor of the Diliman Diary)