BY EVANGELINE DE VERA

A SANDIGANBAYAN associate justice and two appellate justices topped the list of nominees for the vacancy at the Supreme Court following the retirement of Associate Justice Adolfo Azcuna last Feb. 17.

Supreme Court spokesman Jose Midas Marquez said Sandiganbayan justice Francisco Villaruz and appellate justices Martin Villarama and Lucas Bersamin each got nine votes from the SC justices.

The voting was held after the regular en banc session.

The top three nominees will be automatically included in the shortlist which the Judicial and Bar Council will submit to President Arroyo. The President has 90 days within which to select a name from the shortlist.

Under Rule 8, Section 1 of the rules of the JBC, "in every case involving an appointment to a seat in the Supreme Court, the council shall give due weight and regard to the recommendees of the Supreme Court."

Villaruz was one of the three justices at the Sandiganbayan Special Division that convicted President Joseph Estrada for plunder in September 2007.

The two others were then Presiding Justice Teresita Leonardo-Castro and Justice Diosdado Peralta. Both have been appointed by President Arroyo to the SC.

Villarama, husband of SC clerk of court Ma. Luisa Villarama, is the chairman of the CA Third Division.

Bersamin is the younger brother of Abra Rep. Luis Bersamin who was gunned down along with his bodyguard on Dec. 16, 2007.

Bersamin has ruled against presidential spouse Jose Miguel "Mike" Arroyo in a land ownership case. He was one of the two dissenters in a 2007 decision penned by fellow SC nominee justice Juan Enriquez, which granted an almost 9 million sq. m. estate in Tatalon, Quezon City to the Tuasons, Arroyo’s maternal side.

Other nominees for the SC post are Court of Tax Appeals presiding justice Ernesto Acosta, who got six votes, and CA justices Hakim Abdulwahid, Remedios Salazar-Fernando, Portia Alino-Hormachuelos and real estate lawyer Rodolfo Robles, who got four votes each.