Interesting comment on an earlier post:

"Re: Fortune-telling judge couldn't see it coming - "A Philippine judge who claimed he could see into the future and admitted consulting imaginary mystic dwarfs has asked for his job back after being fired by the country's Supreme Court. "They should not have dismissed me for what I believed," Florentino Floro, a trial judge in the capital's Malabon northern suburb, told reporters after filing his appeal."

posted by Agagooga @ 9:32 PM

Comment:

May I add and attach herewith the recent report of Ken Underhill, Lowering the Bar ---
http://www.loweringthebar.net/2006/06/lowering_the_ba.html

Amended comment -
http://www.sunstar.com.ph/static/man/2004/03/12/news/judge.asks.sc.to.let.nazario.take.oath.and.fill.sc.vacancy.html

Re: The Philippine “HEALING / PSYCHIC JUDGE” – 54 & 15 = 69 minutes Philippine Television Documentary uploaded on www.youtube.com --- type judge floro, in the upper search and click/enter; or just click the following:

http://www.youtube.com/results?search=judge+floro&search_type=search_videos&search=Search

Judge Florentino V. Floro Jr., “Healing Judge” Part 1 of 6 - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wECTKjkkZLs&search=judge%20floro

I am Judge Florentino V. Floro, Jr. (a Regional Trial Court Judge of Br. 73, Malabon, NCJR, Metro Manila, REPUBLIC OF THE PHILIPPINES). My physical address is 123 Dahlia, Alido, Malolos, 3000 Bulacan, Philippines. My E-mail Address is: judge_florentino_v_floro@yahoo.com; my telephone number is (044) 662-82-03, digitel, Philippines."


And a followup email:

Dismissed judge, elfin pals claim immortality

By Armand Nocum
Inquirer
Last updated 02:42am (Mla time) 08/06/2006

Published on page A1 of the August 6, 2006 issue of the Philippine Daily Inquirer
HIS pals, “the imaginary dwarfs” Armand, Luis and Angel, may not have impressed the justices of the Supreme Court but, according to dismissed Judge Florentino Floro Jr., he and his three friends were superstars among psychics and believers of the occult throughout the world.
The high court last April dismissed the 53-year-old Floro, a Malabon Regional Trial Court judge, after finding that he was suffering from a mental “disabling condition” that it said made it impossible for him to discharge his judicial functions.
Floro now claims that the news of his sacking—which came out on CNN, Time magazine and The New York Times, among more than a hundred international news agencies and publications—has given him and the three dwarfs “immortality.”
Mind-boggling delay
In CNN’s “Showbiz Tonight” show, co-host A.J. Hammer singled out the news story on Floro as the story of the day.
Although he joked that there was nothing wrong with consulting dwarfs from time to time, Hammer pointed to the three-year delay in the investigation of Floro as mind-boggling.
“Dwarfs, healing sessions, a three-year investigation? Now, that’s ridiculous!” he said.
In NBC’s “Countdown w/ Keith Olbermann” show, Floro was cited as “No. 2” in Countdown’s “three top newsmakers of the day” last April 11.
Floro graduated with second honors from the Ateneo de Manila University law school and placed 12th in the 1983 bar examinations with a grade of 87.55 percent.
“From obscurity, my name ... and the three mystic dwarfs became immortal not only in this country, not solely in the international broadcasts (CNN, MSN-NBC) and in almost all print media worldwide, but first and foremost, in the indelible memory of world judicial history,” he said in a letter to the court that he sent to Chief Justice Artemio Panganiban last Friday.
Occult blogs
Floro said news of his dismissal also figured in forum discussions in more than 1,000 blogs all over the world and elicited 10,000 replies, with believers of the occult and those who claim to see spirits and dwarfs siding with him.
In the letter, to which he attached about 200 pages of international news stories about him, Floro “begged” the court to act on his partial motion for reconsideration. He asked that he be returned to the service and given the 83 months’ worth of back wages that accumulated during the period of his preventive suspension before he was eventually dismissed.
The high court had rejected five such previous motions from Floro.
In a decision penned by Associate Justice Minita Chico-Nazario, the high court found Floro guilty of seven of the 13 administrative charges lodged against him by the Office of the Court Administrator (OCA).
During the three-year investigation of the case by the OCA, during which he was interviewed by doctors, psychologists and other medical experts, Floro admitted that he believed in “psychic visions” of the future because of his powers and mastery of “psychic phenomenon.”
Healing sessions
He also confessed that he had made a covenant with his “dwarf friends,” that he could write while in a trance and that he had been seen by several people in two places at the same time.
Questioned by court officials, Floro also admitted conducting healing sessions in his chambers during breaks.

“Psychic phenomena, even assuming such exist, have no place in a judiciary duty-bound to apply only positive law and, in its absence, equitable rules and principles in resolving controversies,” the court said in its en banc decision.
The court also ordered Floro to pay the amount of P40,000 as a penalty but awarded him three years’ worth of back salaries, allowances and other economic benefits.
‘Psychosis’
However, the high court said that it was not within its authority to conclude that Floro was “insane” but said it agreed with the findings of the Supreme Court clinic that showed Floro to be suffering from “psychosis.”
According to Floro, the international paranormal and legal discussions triggered by his case had made him “immortal.”
“When you hit it big in the print media internationally, you are immortal,” he said.