*Yawn*
Prosecution, specifically Mario Bautista, the lawyer conducting direct examination, should have asked for a two-week continuance.
First blunder: he didn’t know how the rules of evidence apply. Suppletory? he asked. Whoa, I thought he has had experience with this considering his role in the Estrada impeachment trial 11 years ago.
Then, he kept asking repetitive questions.
Then, he starts treating his own witness as a hostile witness. And Presiding Officer Enrile starts to lecture him on how he can’t cross-examine and impeach his own witness unless he presents her as a hostile witness which he has not.
His point? He admitted he was trying to find out if the SALNs could be tampered with after they had been submitted and received by the clerk of court.
The substantive points:
1. Although SALNs are public documents, requests for copies are passed on by the Clerk of Court to the justices who decide on whether the requests shall be granted or not. In short, it is not within the authority of the Clerk of Court to decide whether to grant the requests or not.
2. Atty. Bautista manifests that prosecution will ask for the issuance of a subpoena duces tecum for the production of the SALNs.
3. Senator Franklin Drilon orders the witness Clerk of Court to produce the SALNs. Witness responds that she has not been so authorized by the Supreme Court. But, Drilon says, the subpoena is directed at her, not at the Supreme Court.
So, finally, a substantive issue to ponder on. If the justices refuse to allow her to produce the SALNs before the impeachment court, then, that puts the impeachment court at the mercy of the Supreme Court.
@4.13 p.m.
Former Justice Cuevas, lead counsel for respondent Corona, is getting tiresome.
@6.31 p.m.
As tiresome as former Justice Cuevas may be for his incessant objections and manifestations, he really is making the prosecution lawyers look like very, very green noobs.
So, another private prosecutor, Jose Justiniano, takes center stage. His task? Conduct direct examination of a Malacañang employee who will testify on the receipt of Corona’s SALNs from 1992 to 2002. The objective? Show a trend that he had only so much at the beginning and, over time, started accumulating wealth while in public office.
Cuevas objects — but Corona is not being impeached for ill-gotten wealth; he is being impeached for failure to declare certain properties in his SALNs.
From the verified complaint:
RESPONDENT COMMITTED CULPABLE VIOLATION OF THE CONSTITUTION AND/OR BETRAYED THE PUBLIC TRUST WHEN HE FAILED TO DISCLOSE TO THE PUBLIC HIS STATEMENT OF ASSETS, LIABILITIES, AND NET WORTH AS REQUIRED UNDER SEC. 17, ART. XI OF THE 1987 CONSTITUTION.
Atty. Justiniano insists that it covers ill-gotten wealth because Article 2.4 of the complaint states that:
2.4. Respondent is likewise suspected and accused of having accumulated ill-gotten wealth, acquiring assets of high values and keeping bank accounts with huge deposits. It has been reported that Respondent has, among others, a 300-sq. meter apartment in a posh Mega World Property development at the Fort in Taguig. Has he reported this, as he is constitutionally-required under Art. XI, Sec. 17 of the Constitution in his Statement of Assets and Liabilities and Net Worth (SALN)? Is this acquisition sustained and duly supported by his income as a public official? Since his assumption as Associate and subsequently, Chief Justice, has he complied with this duty of public disclosure?
If we’re to stick with proper language, it would appear the Cuevas is correct. Art. 2.4 is does not allege ultimate facts to show that Corona has ill-gotten wealth. The reference to the property at the Fort was only an example of what he had failed to report in his SALN, period.
But this is an impeachment case. The impeachment court has the power to adopt its own rules. So, let’s see…
