Court employee fined 10K for failing to remit 12.7K

In the case of Delayed Remittance of Collections of Teresita Lydia Odtuhan, a court legal researcher of RTC Pasay City was found guilty of serious misconduct in office for failing to remit a P12,705 fund collection to the proper custodian until after a lapse of about three years and only after several demands or directives from the clerks of court and from the OCA. For humanitarian reasons, the Court found dismissal from the service to be too harsh considering that Odtuhan subsequently remitted the entire amount and she was afflicted with ovarian cancer, and imposed upon her a FINE of P10,000, with a stern warning that a repetition of the same or a similar act will be dealt with more severely. (A.M. No. 02-10-598-RTC, 11 February 2003, 397 SCRA 222)