THE Senate Impeachment Court on Thursday granted the House of Representatives prosecution panel’s request to subpoena representatives of seven banks and seven insurance and financial companies for Vice President Sara Z. Duterte’s impeachment trial.
Former senator Antonio Trillanes IV will no longer testify for the prosecution in the impeachment trial.
Bank records and testimony will support the prosecution’s presentation under Article II, involving allegations of unexplained wealth and incomplete or inaccurate financial disclosures.
The seven banks are Land Bank of the Philippines, Asia United Bank, Philippine Savings Bank, Metropolitan Bank and Trust Co., Bank of the Philippine Islands, Philippine National Bank, and BDO Unibank. The insurance and financial companies are Prudential Life, Allianz, Manufacturers Life, FWD Life, BPI-AIA Life, BDO Securities, and BDO Life.
House lead prosecutor Batangas Rep. Gerville Luistro of Batangas also told the impeachment court that the prosecution had reached a final decision not to present Trillanes as a witness. She also asked for the court’s understanding over the delay in communicating its position.
She did not explain why Trillanes was removed from the witness list.
Meanwhile, the bank representatives are scheduled to appear on Tuesday, October 6, following the presentation of a Bureau of Internal Revenue witness on Monday.
Presiding Officer Sen. Francis Escudero approved subpoenas requiring the witnesses to appear, testify, and bring the specified records. The orders cover the BIR and the identified banks, insurance companies, and financial institutions.
The defense requested advance copies of summaries and other documents that the witnesses intend to identify during their testimony. Escudero granted the request and instructed the prosecution to provide the materials before their appearances.
The prosecution previously announced that it would establish the subpoenaed bank records individually after the court rejected its request to compel Duterte to respond to a Request for Admission concerning those records.
Anti-Money Laundering Council Secretariat Executive Director Ronel Buenaventura presented his testimony on Thursday afternoon. His appearance could continue on Friday if necessary.
Prosecutors also presented official land records for two properties associated with Duterte’s husband, lawyer Manases Carpio. Their combined acquisition prices amounted to approximately P9.45 million, raising questions about whether they were properly reflected in Duterte’s Statements of Assets, Liabilities and Net Worth, or SALNs.
Davao City Register of Deeds Kathy Florence Baldonado testified that a 379-square-meter property in Matina, Davao City, was purchased on July 2, 2024, for P6 million. The title identifies Carpio as the registered owner and records his marriage to Duterte.
An annotation on the title showed that Carpio and Duterte executed a real estate mortgage in favor of Philippine Savings Bank for P8 million. The mortgage was dated August 27, 2024, less than two months after the property’s purchase.
House prosecutor Jonathan Keith Flores of Bukidnon highlighted the sequence of the transactions. Baldonado confirmed that the documents showed a P6-million purchase in July followed by an P8-million mortgage in August of the same year.
When the records were compared with Duterte’s 2025 SALN, Baldonado said she could not identify an entry matching the property’s price and other documented details. Escudero noted that the SALN descriptions were insufficiently detailed to establish a direct correspondence with individual property titles.
Defense counsel Lindon Miguel Bacquel maintained that the Matina property could correspond to an asset already listed in Duterte’s SALN. He explained that Matina Crossing is also known as Barangay 74A, and Escudero allowed the defense to pursue this explanation during cross-examination.
The prosecution presented a second property in the Island Garden City of Samal, Davao del Norte, purchased in 2018 for P3,453,849. Acting Register of Deeds Marco Pineda testified that its title remained active and uncancelled and that the property was still registered to Carpio.
After comparing the 2018 Deed of Absolute Sale with Duterte’s 2019 SALN using the acquisition year, location, and value, Pineda said he could not find a corresponding entry that perfectly matched the property.
Flores emphasized that the amounts involved were substantial to ordinary citizens. Referring to the Matina property, he said ‘Some may say this is only a few million pesos, but for an ordinary Filipino, P6 million is already a substantial amount.’
House prosecution adviser and spokesperson Robert Ace Barbers said the records should be examined alongside the relevant sworn declarations. ‘The P3.45 million is one story. The oath is the bigger story,’ he said, emphasizing that the prosecution’s concern involved the completeness of the SALNs.
House trial spokesperson Lanao del Sur Rep. Zia-ur Rahman Alonto Adiong similarly stressed the significance of signing a financial declaration under oath.
‘The SALN is an affirmation of your wealth under oath. When you sign it, you swear that your financial declaration is complete and truthful,’ he said, in English translation.
He argued that registration in a spouse’s name does not automatically remove a property from the disclosure issue.
Prosecution spokespersons said proven discrepancies could support the allegations under Article II, while any separate criminal allegation, including perjury, would require proof of its own statutory elements.