Corona will appear at Senate trial Friday

MANILA, Philippines—Chief Justice Renato Corona, together with his doctor, will appear at the impeachment trial on Friday.
This is what lead defense lawyer Serafin Cuevas told reporters at The Medical City hospital in Pasig City when asked if Corona will continue his testimony.
Cuevas had just visited Corona when reporters approached him.
He said Corona was “incoherent” and hooked up to a dextrose intravenous drip.
Despite this, Cuevas said, the chief justice will be present at the trial on Friday.
Son confirms
The Chief Justice’s son, musician Francis “Frank” Corona, confirmed the conversation between his father and Cuevas.
“Whatever Justice Cuevas said is what my father said to him,” Francis said in a text message to INQUIRER.net.
However, contrary to what Cuevas earlier said of Corona being “incoherent,” Francis said his father is in a stable condition.
“He is getting better already.”

Current Events in Philippines

Key defense witness is lawyer-accountant

Defense lawyers are gearing up for a crucial phase in the proceedings, putting “finishing touches” on the testimony of a key witness who will “lay the groundwork” for Chief Justice Renato Corona’s likely appearance as the “climax” of the impeachment trial.

Describing Article 2 of the impeachment complaint as the real “battleground,” defense counsel Ramon Esguerra said the witness—a lawyer and a certified public accountant (CPA) —would discuss in detail that “there is every justification for the entries” in Corona’s statements of assets, liabilities and net worth (SALN).

Esguerra said the Chief Justice would then explain the sources of money declared in the SALNs, including those used to purchase properties mentioned in the documents.

“The emerging consensus is he will take the stand,” Esguerra told the Philippine Daily Inquirer in an interview shortly after Corona met with his 12 lawyers for around three hours in Makati City on Friday afternoon.

Asked how soon the Chief Justice would testify, the defense counsel said: “I think logically, he should be the last to take the (witness) stand because it would be anticlimactic if he would come first.”

Trial will resume on March 12 with the defense presentation after the prosecution rested its case last week.

Article 2 alleges that Corona failed to publicly disclose his SALNs and thus, committed a culpable violation of the Constitution.

Esguerra (no relation to this reporter) said Corona made it clear to his lawyers that he had “no problem” testifying in his own impeachment trial. “It cannot be foreclosed,” he said.

In the defense panel’s list of witnesses and documents submitted to the impeachment court on January 31, the CPA-lawyer was not named but was described as an “expert witness” who would “testify that CJ Corona did not violate the Constitution and pertinent laws on the SALN, and that (his) assets came from legitimate sources and the values he used thereon have legal basis.”

The testimony will be backed by documentary evidence purportedly showing that Corona “also received allowances and other emoluments as justice of the Supreme Court” and that “he and his wife have the lawful means to acquire the alleged properties.”

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Corona urged to testify

With the prosecution resting its case, Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile on Wednesday said Chief Justice Renato Corona’s best defense was to take the witness stand and personally rebut charges he fudged his asset declarations and showed bias in favor of former President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo.

Before adjourning Day 25 of the trial, which will resume on March 12 for the defense presentation, the court gave the prosecution until Friday to submit a formal offer of documentary evidence and Corona’s lawyers five days to respond.

Enrile warned prosecutors against claiming that they had presented overwhelming evidence to convict Corona.

“You are putting this court in a very serious predicament because you already make pronouncements about the weight and the quantum of the evidence that you have presented for your side,” Enrile said.

“Please do not make sweeping statements outside that may befuddle or confuse the people or convince them that you’ve won already,” he said. “There’s no winner yet. Don’t be too sure.

The tribunal’s presiding officer agreed that it would be in Corona’s “best interest” to take the witness stand and testify, particularly on Articles 2 and 7 of the impeachment complaint.

“That’s my view,” Enrile said in Filipino in an ambush interview. “To me, he needs to explain only on two things, Article 2 and Article 7.”

Article 2 refers to Corona’s alleged failure to publicly disclose his statement of assets, liabilities and net worth (SALN). In the course of the trial, the prosecution noted alleged discrepancies between entries in his SALN and the actual value of his properties and peso bank accounts.

Article 7 alleges that Corona had favored Arroyo, now a Pampanga congresswoman, through the Supreme Court’s issuance of a Nov. 15, 2011, temporary restraining order (TRO) allowing her to seek medical treatment abroad while she was facing charges of electoral sabotage.

Enrile offered a theory on why the prosecution announced on Tuesday to drop five of its eight articles of impeachment for alleged betrayal of public trust and culpable violation of the Constitution.

“They know that if they pursued (the rest of the articles), they could not secure the required votes to remove the respondent using those five articles that they removed … They didn’t want to waste their effort on these anymore,” he said in Filipino in a radio interview.

Prosecutors need to secure the vote of at least 16 senators in at least one article of impeachment to convict Corona.

“Psychologically, many interpretations could be drawn (from the prosecution move) because you make an allegation and then you withdraw it. That means that you have no evidence to prove it,” Enrile said in an ambush interview.

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Row over testimony of Supreme Court justice looms

Will Associate Justice Maria Lourdes Sereno’s testimony end up with Supreme Court justices washing their dirty linen in public?

Senator Miriam Defensor-Santiago on Sunday cautioned against the prosecution’s insistence to have Sereno appear as its witness in the impeachment trial of Chief Justice Renato Corona.

“Even if she’s willing to testify alone, it would be a slippery slope. It would open the door for other Supreme Court justices appearing in an impeachment trial over one pretext or another,” Santiago told the Philippine Daily Inquirer in a phone interview.

“When the time comes for the defense to present its case, what would prevent them from inviting other justices who, as you say, were critical of Justice Sereno’s dissenting opinion? The prosecution can’t claim this (privilege) alone.”

Senate Majority Leader Vicente Sotto III said he would give a “word of caution” to fellow senator-judges when the caucus took up the matter at 11 a.m. today.

“There might be a conflict within the Supreme Court and we might only worsen it,” Sotto said in Filipino in a separate interview.

Prosecutors want Sereno, an appointee of President Benigno Aquino III, to testify on her dissenting opinion on the effectivity of the high tribunal’s Nov. 15, 2011, temporary restraining order (TRO).

Bayan Muna Representative Neri Colmenares on Sunday said he would file a motion for reconsideration of a February 14 resolution issued by the high tribunal that the court could “not waive privileges attendant to the proposed testimony” of its officials and employees in Corona’s impeachment trial “on matters covered by privilege and confidentiality.”

“It is absurd,” Colmenares said. “This practically means that anyone, from Chief Justice to Supreme Court drivers cannot testify.”

He said the prosecution would press the Senate to subpoena court officials, otherwise it would weaken its power to try impeachment cases.

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Senators to tackle contempt issue, Supreme Court records in caucus

The plate of the senator-judges will be full on Day 20 of the impeachment trial as they tackle three crucial issues, including the possibility of citing Chief Justice Renato Corona’s lawyers for contempt for claiming that Malacañang was trying to bribe senators.

The matter will be the subject of their caucus at 11 a.m. Monday after defense counsels submitted a 12-page explanation wherein they also “humbly apologize … for any misunderstanding or lack of clarity in their intentions and words.”

At the resumption of the trial at 2 p.m., the senators will grill Quezon City Representative Jorge “Bolet” Banal for approaching a bank manager on January 31 to verify apparently leaked documents of Corona’s deposits in his possession.

“We cannot discuss the matter in caucus because we don’t know anything about it,” Senate Majority Leader Tito Sotto told the Philippine Daily Inquirer. “Banal will instead be asked in open court.”

At Thursday’s trial, manager Annabelle Tiongson of Philippine Savings Bank’s Katipunan branch said Banal had sought her assistance on the leaked documents, a request she said she rejected.

Banal later briefly explained in court that he got the documents after someone allegedly left them at his gate in his St. Ignatius residence. The trial was adjourned afterward, with senators asking Banal to appear again this afternoon.

Supreme Court resolution

The caucus, according to Sotto, would take up the Supreme Court’s February 14 resolution allowing only limited access to certain court records the prosecution wanted scrutinized in the impeachment trial.

Defense counsel Ramon Esguerra on Saturday night criticized the “fishing expedition” in the past few trial days. During this period, the court tackled details of Corona’s bank accounts, with senator-judges and not prosecutors making bank officials admit to their existence.

‘Fake documents’

“Given all the realities in the trial, we know they’re wearing our patience thin, wearing us out,” Esguerra said by phone, referring to prosecutors.

“It’s been haywire, a fishing expedition the last three days. Since we cannot object to senator-judges asking questions of the witness, what else can we do? We are really at a disadvantage,” he said.

Tranquil Salvador III, also a member of the defense team, on Sunday said “all evidence (by the prosecution) will fall” in case it turned out that the Senate had subpoenaed Corona’s bank records based on fake documents provided by prosecutors.

“But assuming that they (evidence) stand, we have a good explanation,” he told the Inquirer, referring to discrepancies between money declared in Corona’s statements of assets, liabilities and net worth, and those deposited in his accounts.

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Aquino won’t stop attacks on Corona

BALER, Aurora—President Benigno Aquino III is not about to declare a ceasefire in his word war with impeached Chief Justice Renato Corona despite pleas from senators for the heads of two coequal branches of government to restrain themselves. 

Mr. Aquino on Sunday stepped up his attacks on Corona as Senator Edgardo Angara, one of the judges in Corona’s impeachment trial, sat a few meters away.

The President said his verbal attacks were not directed at the Chief Justice but at “the system” for which Corona was “the face” that the administration was fighting against.

“To keep quiet about the whole thing is, I think, wrong,” he told reporters in response to calls by some senator-judges for him and Corona to stop their word war and to just let the Senate impeachment court do its job.

Attending the 33rd founding anniversary of the province and the commemoration of the 124th birth anniversary of Doña Aurora Aragon-Quezon, the President said he would continue to voice out his thoughts on Corona “if needed.”

He led the wreath-laying rites on the statue of Doña Aurora and later inaugurated Aurora Medical Hospital.

Senator Angara thanked Mr. Aquino for accepting the invitation to attend the celebrations. “We remember acts of kindness and gratitude. We will never forget this,” he told the President during a program held on the capitol grounds.

On Thursday, at a meeting with students from various colleges and universities at La Consolacion College in Manila, Mr. Aquino said Corona’s failure to declare his multimillion-peso bank accounts was sufficient basis to remove him from office.

The President said Corona should be held to account using the same standards that caused a court interpreter to lose her job in 1997 for not declaring ownership of a stall in a public market.

Responding to Mr. Aquino’s attacks, Corona challenged the President to disclose his financial and psychological records. “We have an obligation to the people that we are of sound mind,” the Chief Justice said in a statement.

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Corona closes 3 accounts on day he was impeached By TJ Burgonio

Chief Justice Renato Corona closed three time deposit accounts with the Philippine Savings Bank (PSBank) on the same day House lawmakers filed an impeachment complaint against him in the Senate in December in a bid “to conceal certain amounts” in his statement of assets, liabilities and net worth (SALN), the prosecution has alleged.

This surfaced on Day 19 of Corona’s impeachment trial as PSBank president Pascual Garcia testified on the Chief Justice’s peso accounts in its branch on Katipunan Avenue in Quezon City.

Garcia told the impeachment court that Corona had other accounts in the same branch after branch manager Annabelle Tiongson testified that Corona opened and closed five similar accounts with opening balances totaling P30 million, from 2007 to 2011.

“There’s evidence your honor that shows that three accounts were closed on the same date of Dec. 12, 2011. And this will show that this was in preparation because of the impeachment complaint that was filed,” private prosecutor Demetrio Custodio said in reply to Senator Loren Legarda, who asked the questions for Majority Leader Vicente Sotto III.

At the trial Thursday, private prosecutor Demetrio Custodio claimed that the Chief Justice closed at least three PSBank peso accounts, totaling P32.6 million, on December 12 last year.

These were Account No. 089-121023848, which was opened on June 29, 2011, with P17 million; Account No. 089-121019523, opened on Dec. 22, 2009, with P8.5 million; and Account No. 089-121021681, opened Sept. 1, 2010, with P7,090,099.45.

Only two of the said accounts were covered by the Senate subpoena.

When asked about the relevance of the closure of the accounts with Corona’s December 2010 SALN, Custodio said this has “no direct relevance.”

“We are only intending to show that there was an attempt to conceal certain amounts. If there will be a consideration of three amounts of the three accounts, they total about P36.2 million,” Custodio said.

Under questioning, Garcia said that Corona closed three bank accounts on Dec. 12, 2011, on the same day 188 lawmakers transmitted the impeachment complaint to the Senate for trial for culpable violation of the Constitution, betrayal of public trust and corruption. He did not give details.

Garcia volunteered that Corona opened a peso time deposit account on June 29, 2011, with a balance of P17 million and closed it on Dec. 12, 2011.

Senator Sergio Osmeña III wondered if the day of the account’s termination was the same day the impeachment complaint was filed.

The House lead prosecutor, Iloilo Rep. Niel Tupas Jr., confirmed this: “The House impeached the Chief Justice on December 12.”

In reply to Pro Tempore Jinggoy Estrada, Garcia admitted that Corona had two other peso time deposit accounts—one opened on Dec. 22, 2009, and another on Sept. 1, 2010, which were also closed on Dec. 12, 2011.

Garcia said he could not say if the accounts were preterminated.

“Because when we open an account let’s say it’s for 60 days, you have the account opening date and the maturity date. So when an account is terminated before the maturity date, then we normally would classify it as a preterminated account because it did not run its full term,” he said.

“It’s quite suspicious,” Estrada said. “These three accounts … they were all closed on the day that the Chief Justice was impeached. And according to Congressman Tupas, the Chief Justice was impeached on Dec. 12, 2011. And all of these three accounts were closed. I don’t want to entertain suspicions, or malice, but I really have suspicions.”

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‘Fake’ evidence confirms Corona bank accounts

While Chief Justice Renato Corona’s accusers cannot guarantee the authenticity of the documents concerning his local and foreign currency deposits, the testimonies of bank officials prove that the information in the documents is accurate.

Marikina Representative Romero Quimbo, the prosecution spokesman, stressed this on Tuesday in the course of saying that the prosecutors had no intention of misleading the Senate impeachment court when they attached the bank documents to their request for a subpoena.

Quimbo said the prosecution had actually advised the impeachment court that it could not “vouch for the authenticity” of the bank documents that, according to the Monday testimony of Annabelle Tiongson, the manager of Philippine Savings Bank (PSBank) branch on Katipunan Avenue, Quezon City, were “fake” and did not come from her branch.

But Quimbo said the documents that were turned over to the prosecution by an anonymous source could “only come from the bank.”

“The best proof that it came from the bank is that the accounts precisely matched. The bank officials confirmed the existence of the accounts, that they were owned by the Chief Justice,” he said in a press briefing after yesterday’s trial.

Accounts exist

Quimbo said PSBank, particularly Tiongson, had “every incentive or motivation” to declare the documents fake because these could only have come from them.

He assailed the defense for saying that all evidence pertaining to Corona’s bank deposits that had been disclosed and admitted by PSBank should be cast aside for being the “fruit of a poisonous tree,” or inadmissible.

Quimbo pointed out that the existence of Corona’s bank accounts was confirmed by no less than PSBank president Pascual Garcia III and Tiongson herself.

He said both bank officers testified that Corona kept almost P20 million in two accounts alone with PSBank as of Dec. 31, 2010. The Chief Justice only declared cash worth P3.5 million in his statement of assets, liabilities and net worth (SALN) for the same year.

Corona’s lawyers had protested the prosecution’s marking of the documents from PSBank and Bank of the Philippine Island (BPI) as evidence, saying these were obtained illegally.

But Quimbo said the prosecution’s supplemental motion on a request for subpoena for the bank records stated with caution that it could not vouch for the authenticity of the documents, although these turned out to be true.

Quimbo said that from the start of the trial, the prosecutors had been transparent and forthright in the supplemental motion for subpoena they submitted to the impeachment court on February 3 in connection with Corona’s bank accounts.

But he agreed that whoever was responsible for the circulation of the copies of the Corona bank documents was in clear violation of the Bank Secrecy Law and should be prosecuted.

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Corona blasts senator-judges

Saying he had “nothing to gain but everything to lose,” Chief Justice Renato Corona slammed senators allegedly attempting to turn his impeachment trial in the Senate into an “inquisition” alongside a Palace campaign to “demonize” him.

Corona came out swinging before fellow magistrates and faculty members at the opening of a new facility at Ateneo Law School in Makati City late Friday evening.

“As if the impeachment trial were not enough, some senator-judges have taken on the role of prosecutors and have converted what should be an adversarial proceeding into an inquisition,” he said without naming names in a speech titled “Excellence in Law: Destiny of the Ateneo Lawyer.”

“I can no longer count how many of my constitutional rights have been blatantly and grossly violated,” he said.

Corona’s defense lawyers earlier sought the inhibition of Sen. Franklin Drilon, a staunch ally and party-mate of President Aquino, for helping the prosecution on a number of occasions during the trial.

Drilon rejected the call while the Senate, sitting as an impeachment court, simply ignored the motion.

The President’s deputy spokesperson, Abigail Valte, dismissed Corona’s blast as an “act of desperation.” She said the impeachment trial was all about Corona’s “fitness to hold the highest post in the judiciary.”

Repeating a previous statement by Mr. Aquino, she called on Corona to open his dollar bank account to the public if he had nothing to hide.

Corona said central to the effort to oust him was the issue of the Hacienda Luisita, which is owned by the family of the President, who has said that Corona has been an obstacle in the Palace effort to prosecute former President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo for corruption.

The Supreme Court earlier unanimously ruled to turn over the vast estate to farmers. The Cojuangco family would receive P173 million in compensation based on a 1989 valuation, according to the court ruling. But the hacienda later filed a petition seeking some P10 billion on the property’s 2006 market value.

“This whole sordid affair has all been about politics from beginning to end. It is about Hacienda Luisita; the P10-billion compensation which the President’s family reportedly wants for the land that was simply lent to them by the government,” Corona declared.

The Chief Justice cited the “need to terrorize and instill a chilling effect on the justices of the Supreme Court to be able to bend their decisions in favor of the Malacañang tenant.”

He said the impeachment trial, which is openly supported by Malacañang, was also connected to the “need to nullify the constitutional election of the sitting Vice President” and “the need to appoint a new Chief Justice who will deliver anything and everything the President wants.”

Transportation Secretary Manuel “Mar” Roxas II, a close friend and former running mate of Mr. Aquino, is still contesting the victory of Vice President Jejomar Binay in the 2010 elections.

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Defense: P100M offered per senator

On the eve of a crucial Senate vote, lawyers of Chief Justice Renato Corona on Sunday night revealed what they called efforts by Malacañang to pressure some senator-judges into defying a Supreme Court order restraining the impeachment court from looking into his dollar account.

In a hastily arranged press conference, nine members of the defense team condemned the Palace for allegedly undermining the impeachment process and the Constitution for purportedly trying to win senators over.

“Yesterday, we received very reliable information that Executive Secretary Paquito ‘Jojo’ Ochoa, acting in behalf of President Benigno Aquino III, was personally contacting and phoning senator-judges to persuade or pressure them to defy a temporary restraining order (TRO) issued by the Supreme Court  in favor of Philippine Savings Bank,” according to a statement read by lawyer Dennis Manalo.

“We condemn in the strongest terms the efforts of the President to undermine the constitutional process that he himself initiated.”

Jose Roy III, a member of the defense team, said the panel received information that the Palace was dangling “P100 million per senator” to be released this week in exchange for defying the TRO.

The amount would supposedly come from government “savings” allocated for “soft projects.”

While Corona submitted himself to the impeachment process “in good faith and with full belief that he will have a fair trial,” his lawyers said “it is now apparent that the President is bent on convicting [him] at all costs.”

Corona’s camp said he would confront the issue of his bank deposits once the defense gets its turn to formally present evidence later in the impeachment trial.

“If your problem is the bank account, don’t rush it. All of that will be opened by the Chief Justice because he did not steal that. Relax lang po, Mr. President. Don’t let the senators and the Chief Justice violate the law, like what you want your people to do,” part of the statement in Filipino said.

Budget Secretary Florencio Abad said in a text message: “The P100 million is a complete fabrication concocted by the desperate Corona defense lawyers. It’s an insult to the senators and to the Senate as an institution. It’s another lie in a web of lies being woven by the Corona camp to discredit the impeachment process.”

“Such baseless allegations are irresponsible and can only erode the credibility of the defense lawyers,” Abad added.

“Their energies and time are better spent preparing for [today’s] continuing hearings on the hidden and now exposed dollar and peso accounts of Corona in PSBank and BPI,” Abad said, referring to the Chief Justice’s alleged unreported deposits in the two banks.

Reacting to the defense’s allegation, Sen. Panfilo “Ping” Lacson described the alleged P100-million offer as “pure rubbish and nothing more.”

“It is unfair and even contemptuous to preempt the senators who have yet to discuss the matter in a caucus tomorrow,” Lacson, an ally of the President, said in a text message.

During the press conference, Corona’s lawyers were pressed to reveal their sources, but they stood their ground and said it was up to the informant to decide whether to come out. Roy clarified that the tip did not come from any of the senators. He said some of them were in fact “complaining” about the alleged Palace effort.

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Corona has over P12M in deposits at BPI—bank exec

MANILA, Philippines – Chief Justice Renato Corona has over P12 million in deposits at the Bank of the Philippine Islands in Makati City in 2010, a bank official told the Senate, acting as an impeachment court on Thursday.

Leonora Dizon, branch manager of BPI in Makati City, said Corona has an outstanding balance of P12, 024, 067.70 as of Dec. 31, 2010 for checking account number 1445-8030-61.

Corona’s deposit in 2010 notably grew from the previous year’s outstanding balance of P678,501.83 for the same account.

For 2008, the same account had a balance of P1,525,872.87; P5,069,711.18 in 2007; P153,395.12 in 2006; and P 149,767.36 in 2005.

Dizon said the account was opened in 1989.

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