THE defense’s refusal to immediately compare thousands of documents with the House prosecution panel is slowing the impeachment trial of Vice President Sara Duterte, whether the delay is intentional or not, a prosecution lawyer said.
House prosecution counsel and spokesperson Benjamin ‘Jay’ Tolosa Jr. said the prosecution had repeatedly sought to arrange the comparison of documents before state auditor Celine May Del Campo returns to the witness stand.
‘I do not want to judge their intentions or speculate on whether they are deliberately trying to derail or delay the proceedings,’ Tolosa said. ‘But whether it is intentional or not, I think it is clear that this is the result.’
Tolosa said the same issue arose during the pretrial conference in June, when more than 4,000 documents related to Article I had to be marked. At the time, he said, the defense rejected the prosecution’s proposal to jointly mark exhibits common to both sides.
The prosecution maintains that comparing and authenticating the documents outside the formal hearings would save trial time and prevent lengthy disputes when the records are presented as evidence.
Tolosa said the Senate impeachment court had already given both parties another opportunity to compare their respective documents outside the courtroom.
‘The message we received from them was that they wanted to do it on the 14th,’ he said.
According to Tolosa, however, the proposed date would fall after the hearing in which the prosecution intends to use the documents during Del Campo’s testimony.
He said the prosecution would inform the presiding officer of the Senate impeachment court about the situation to make clear that it was not responsible for delaying the proceedings.
‘We will have to inform the presiding officer so that it will be clear that we are not causing the delay,’ Tolosa said. ‘We are genuinely trying to find ways to expedite the proceedings, but this is what is happening.’
Disputes over the records have already forced the impeachment court to call recesses so the two sides could compare and authenticate documents during the hearings.
‘We have seen that the senator-judges were beginning to lose patience because trial time was being wasted,’ Tolosa said.
The prosecution said it was prepared to present and authenticate each document individually if the parties failed to reach an agreement. It acknowledged, however, that doing so would consume significantly more trial time.
The defense has yet to respond to Tolosa’s latest allegations.
Meanwhile, House prosecution spokesperson Robert Ace Barbers rejected Duterte’s assertion that ‘law bending’ was taking place during the impeachment trial.
Barbers said he was surprised and puzzled by the vice president’s statement and denied that the prosecution had manipulated or disregarded the law in presenting its case.
‘On behalf of the prosecution team, we vehemently deny that we are engaged in so-called ‘law bending’ in the conduct of the impeachment trial. If we are not engaged in such, then perhaps the Impeachment Court can clarify if it is engaged in such law bending. Maybe it is the court that the VP is referring to,’ Barbers said.
Barbers maintained that the evidence presented during the trial had not been manufactured by the prosecution.
He cited a video related to the grave-threat allegations against Duterte, saying both the prosecution and defense had used the recording and accepted it as evidence.
‘The video connected to the grave-threat charge is authentic. It was used by both the prosecution and the defense and was accepted as evidence,’ Barbers said.
‘Who made the threats and is now denying or attempting to justify them? Is that justification among the circumstances recognized under the Revised Penal Code?’ he asked.
Barbers also said the documents being presented in connection with the confidential and intelligence funds were the same records that the Office of the Vice President had submitted to the Commission on Audit as part of its liquidation.
‘The documents submitted by the OVP to COA for the liquidation of its confidential and intelligence funds are the same documents being presented by the prosecution. Nothing was fabricated,’ he said.
The prosecution has used the documents to support allegations of irregularities in the disbursement and liquidation of the confidential funds of the OVP and the Department of Education.
Duterte previously served concurrently as vice president and education secretary.
Barbers said the defense should instead explain why the OVP and DepEd allegedly failed to submit the proper liquidation documents despite having several lawyers in their employ.
‘If there was any law bending, perhaps the defense should explain why no proper liquidation was undertaken to prove that the confidential funds had been spent in the manner permitted by law, despite the employment of several lawyers in the OVP and DepEd,’ he said.