Ricardo C. Puno Sr. & Ricardo V. Puno Jr.

The expertise in trial techniques of PunoLaw’s litigation team is not only borne out of  years of trial practice and mastery of substantive and procedural rules but is also the result of the guidance and tutelage of its Founding Partner, Justice Ricardo C. Puno, Sr.

When Justice Puno was still active in private practice, he acted as lead counsel for the firm’s high-profile clients and all their cases were successfully pursued or defended. Those case involved, among many others:

• The settlement of conflicting claims over one of the biggest reclamation projects of the country involving certain reclaimed lands in Pasay City, Philippines covering an area of about 200 hectares. The area is now a thriving commercial district that is host to many businesses including hotels, retail, condominiums, offices, and other businesses.
• The reconveyance of a multi-million peso prime real property located in one of the wealthiest central business districts in Metro Manila, Philippines.
• The defense of a client before the Supreme Court of the Philippines against a party which claimed to have a title over 50 hectares of land that straddled a portion of 100 hectares of prime property owned by PunoLaw’s client. In a landmark decision of the Supreme Court in 2009, PunoLaw’s client was declared to have a valid title over the disputed land. The decision saved millions of residents in the area, including students of a university, from being displaced.
• The prosecution of the claim of a league of cities of the Philippines against several cityhood laws which granted certain municipalities the status of cities despite the failure to comply with the requirements of the law. The case enriched jurisprudence in the Philippines and provided clarity on the status of certain municipalities affected by the challenged cityhood laws.

Justice Puno joined the government service in 1962 as District Judge of the Court of First Instance (“CFI”) of Zambales. After being transferred in 1964 to the CFI of Bulacan, he was promoted, over a year later, to the CFI of Manila where he became the Executive Judge. In 1973, he was appointed Associate Justice in the Court of Appeals and became Chairman of its Ninth Division.

In 1978, Justice Puno left the judiciary after being elected as Representative (Assemblyman) of the National Capital Region in the Batasang Pambansa (Parliament).

In 1979, Justice Puno was appointed Minister of Justice where he revamped the national prosecution service and strengthened the organizational set-up of his department. Upon his initiatives, the Land Registration Commission was transformed into a more efficient National Land Titles and Deeds Registration Administration. He launched projects to humanize and democratize justice. He established a mechanism that would speed up the processing of the criminal cases of detention prisoners in Metro Manila jails. He also served as Co-Chairman of the 1979 Presidential Committee that recommended the basic guidelines to reorganize the judiciary.

Justice Puno is a recognized legal luminary and authority both here and abroad in Civil Law and Remedial Law. He drafted a bill as Chairman of the Committee on Justice, Human Rights and Good Government of the Batasang Pambansa, which was later enacted as “The Judiciary Reorganization Act of 1980” (Batas Pambansa Blg. 129), which law remains up to this day as the structural foundation of the Philippine trial court system. Justice Puno also served as Co-Chairman of the Civil Code Revision Committee which drafted the New Family Code of the Philippines, which was promulgated under Executive Order No. 209 issued by President Corazon C. Aquino on July 6, 1987.