Marcos human rights victims regime lose petition asking enforcement of US court award of $2 billion in damages

July 16, 2017

The Court of Appeals has dismissed a petition filed by several victims of human rights violations during the Marcos administration seeking enforcement of a final judgment of the US court awarding $2 billion in damages. In a 19-page decision promulgated on July 7, the CA’s Twelfth Division through Associate Justice Normandie Pizarro upheld the decision by the Makati City Regional Trial Court dismissing complaint for recognition and enforcement of foreign judgment filed by Priscilla Mijares, Loretta Ann Rosales, Hilda Narciso Sr., Mariani Dimaranan and Joel Lamangan in their behalf and on behalf of the class plaintiffs in US case, Class Action No. MDL 840 consisting of approximately 10,000 human rights victims during the dictator’s regime. The appellate court said final judgment rendered by the Hawaii  Court on February 3, 1995 awarding a total of $1.964 billion in damages to human rights victims during the Marcos administration is not binding because the court had no jurisdiction as the right to due process of all the unnamed claimants, as well as the respondent Marcos estate, had been violated. “To our minds, the failure of the final judgment to meet the standards of what a valid judgment is in our country compels us to deny its enforcement,” the CA said. “Rules of comity should not be made to prevail over our Constitution and we cannot allow foreign impositions to trample upon our sovereignty,” appellate court added. The appeals court said the Hawaii District Court certified MDL 840 as a class suit, which should mean parties who file the case for themselves and those they seek to represent share a common legal interest – “that is, the subject of the suit over which there exists a cause of action is common to all persons who belong to the group.” But the appeals court CA stressed in the final judgment issued by the Hawaii court, the claimants were classified into three subclasses according to the basis of their claims namely, torture, summary execution and disappearance victims. According to the appellate court, such classification of the claimants is an obvious recognition that “no common question of law and fact exists between/among the claimants.” “In other words, each claimant in MDL 840 had a right, if any, only to the damage that such individual may have suffered, and not one of them had any right to or can claim any interest in the damage or injury which another suffered,” it ruled. “Hence, MDL 840 was not and should not have been brought as a class suit.” The CA also ruled that the Hawaii Court failed to ensure the 10 Filipino citizens who initiated MDL 840 – Celsa Hilao, Josefina Hilao Forcadilla, Arturo Revilla, Jr., Rodolfo Benosa, Danila Fuente, Renato Pineda, Adora Faye de Vera, Domiciano Amparo, Christopher Sorio, and Jose Duran, --  were truly and legally authorized by the other purported claimants. It noted Hilao, et al did not identify other claimants they purportedly represent and also failed to present any power of attorney from any of them. “In the absence, therefore, of such authority, the final judgment rendered by said court is not binding because the right to due process of all the unnamed claimants, as well as the herein respondent estate, had been violated,” the CA stressed. DMS