SUPREME Court Associate Justice Lucas P. Bersamin leads the group of honorees and awardees in this year’s Gusi Peace Prize International Awards.
Bersamin is currently the most senior SC Justice in the Judiciary, with 32 years of service in the third branch of government.
While Bersamin ranked as the third most senior magistrate of the SC, he is the most senior justice in terms of service in the courts.
The Gusi Peace Prize International Awards will be held at 6 p.m. on November 28 at the Philippine International Convention Center (PICC). Awards will be given to honorees from Argentina, Costa Rica, Australia, Ethiopia, Germany, India, USA, Portugal, Pakistan, Turkey, South Africa and Poland for their outstanding contribution to peace in performing their profession and calling.
Bersamin will be one of the two Filipinos who will receive the award this year, along with Gen. Antonio Tamayo. Bersamin entered the Judiciary right after the Edsa 2 People Power Revolution, on November 5, 1986, as a Regional Trial Court judge in Quezon City at the age of 37.
In his stint in the RTC, he became the recipient of the Chief Justice Fred Ruiz Castro Memorabilia Commission with the coveted distinction of writing the Best Decision in Civil Law and the Best Decision in Criminal Law, topping all RTC judges in 1999—the only time that both awards were won by the same judge in the same year. Justice Ricardo C. Puno, Sr., as the chairman of the awarding Commission, described Judge Bersamin’s feat as “unprecedented” because no other trial judge has accomplished such.
In 2002, Justice Bersamin won the Chief Justice Jose Abad Santos Award as Outstanding RTC Judge of that year. The award was given by the prestigious Foundation for Judicial Excellence.
Bersamin was appointed an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court on April 2, 2009 by President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo. He was then sitting as a Member of the Court of Appeals, to which he was appointed also by Arroyo on March 10, 2003.
Bersamin penned the landmark cases of De Castro vs JBC which allowed the appointment by then President Arroyo of Chief Justice Renato Corona; the acquittal of Arroyo via Demurrer to Evidence; and giving bail to former Senator Juan Ponce Enrile. He was also lead in declaring unconstitutional the pork barrel of the lawmakers and the Disbursement Acceleration Program (DAP) of the Aquino administration.
Bersamin placed 9th in the Bar after graduating from the University of the East College of Law.
Justice Bersamin hails from Bangued, Abra, where he was born on October 18, 1949. His father, the late Dr. Luis F. Bersamin, Sr., was a World War II veteran, and was part of the infamous Death March involving captured Filipino and American soldiers. He became a provincial governor of Abra at the end of World War II. Justice Bersamin’s mother was the late Dr. Rosario Purugganan-Bersamin, a pharmacist and educator.
His oldest brother was the late Cong. Luis P. Bersamin, Jr., representing the Lone District of Abra. Another brother, Eustaquio P. Bersamin, served three terms as provincial governor of Abra.