Impeachment Not Criminal Trial, House Prosecutors Assert

MANILA, Philippines — The House lead prosecutor pushed back Thursday, July 9, against the Duterte camp's challenge that they produce the "assassin" Vice President Sara Duterte allegedly hired, saying an impeachment does not use the same criminal standard of proof beyond reasonable doubt. Rep. Jinky Luistro (Batangas, 2nd Distrct) said prosecutors were confident in their evidence, but would not be held to a standard way beyond what's required of an impeachment. Proof beyond reasonable doubt, she said, belongs to criminal proceedings, where one gets acquitted for the slightest gap in evidence. "We are confident as far as impeachment trial is concerned, our evidence is strong," Luistro said in an interview on ANC's Headstart. "But please do not ask from us a quantum of evidence which is applied only in a criminal case." Luistro was referring to the closing argument the defense left with the Senate impeachment court on Wednesday, when defense counsel Mark Vinluan told senator-judges that prosecutors can show no actual proof that Duterte hired a hitman. "In simple words, there is no proof of any contracting of an assassin," Vinluan said yesterday, after presiding officer Sen. Chiz Escudero gave them their turn to make a summarizing statement. This was shortly after the end of the defense's cross-examination of the first witness NBI agent John Mark Calilung. Sen. Risa Hontiveros had observed in her question on Tuesday that none of Duterte's statements — captured in videos shown during the trial — proved she actually contracted an assassin. Prosecutor Amando Virgil Ligutan conceded the video may not "100 percent prove" it. Vinluan seized on this exchange yesterday. The prosecution, he said, had admitted the video proves nothing "beyond its own existence." But Luistro on Thursday pointed out that the impeachment court is not being asked to decide whether Duterte committed a crime. "This is not a criminal case," she said on ANC's Headstart. "What we are testing here is whether or not the impeachable official continues to possess the fitness to be able to serve as such and to be able to run to any public office in the future." A convicted official can still be prosecuted afterward, she said, if the same acts independently amount to a crime. "Tapos na ang impeachment doon," Luistro said. "But still a criminal case can be filed in the proper forum." There is "no quantum of evidence required at all" in an impeachment, she said, and the Supreme Court had left it to the conscience of each senator-judge whether to weigh the case by preponderance of evidence, substantial evidence, or clear and convincing evidence. National Bureau of Investigation regional director Jeremy Lotoc takes the stand Monday, July 13. He told the House justice committee in April that the NBI has confirmed Duterte had reached out to an actual assassin. Prosecutors confirmed Wednesday, after Sen. Bam Aquino asked, that they will present a witness on the alleged hitman. Their first witness could not speak to it as Calilung told the court he was assigned only to authenticate the video. Meanwhile, Duterte's chief of staff Zuleika Lopez testifies Tuesday. The court subpoenaed Lopez after the defense argued that her detention by the House in 2024 was what drove Duterte to speak as she did. Capt. Belinda Bello of the House Sergeant-at-Arms office follows on Wednesday, and NBI Director Melvin Matibag may also be called. Information Source: Philstar Nation