Kaufman hopes ICC will dismiss charges; return Duterte to family

Former president Rodrigo Duterte’s defense counsel on Monday expressed hope that the International Criminal Court (ICC) Pre-Trial Chamber I will dismiss the crimes against humanity charges against Duterte and send him back to his family.

“We hope that when you conclude your deliberations, that you dismiss these grievously misplaced and politically motivated charges,” Nicholas Kaufman, Duterte’s legal counsel, said during his confirmation of charges hearing at The Hague in the Netherlands.

“We will ask you to send Rodrigo Duterte back to his family and we will ask you to give back to the Filipino people their Tatay Digong,” he added.

The ICC Office of the Prosecutor has charged Duterte with three counts of crimes against humanity (murder and attempted murder) while implementing his anti-narcotics campaign. 

Kaufman argued that the death rate in the Philippines would have kept rising, with or without Duterte’s drug war, as the country is uniquely positioned to act as a transit hub for drug trafficking from cartels in China.

“Indeed, as we will prove with statistics and reports, the death rate from narcotics related crime actually increased after Rodrigo Duterte left power,” he said.

Meanwhile, Kaufman said Duterte’s “slippery slope to a prison cell” began with the media, which was supposedly controlled by the powerful.

He said Duterte’s speeches were “fertile fodder” for his enemies.

“A man whose hyperbole, bluster, and rhetoric became a natural target for privately-funded NGOs and human rights activists,” he said.

Kaufman said the defense team found more speeches of Duterte that contrasted the  speeches used by the prosecution to prove the alleged incitement to kill.

“The notorious speeches on which the prosecution relies have been cherry picked to suit its narrative, while ignoring the many other speeches when the former president tempered his bombastic language by clear reference to the principle of lawful self-defense,” he said.

According to Kaufman, the ICC prosecution must show that Duterte desired and foresaw that people would be killed as a result of his language.

“So once more, for the record, Rodrigo Duterte’s language was aimed not at suspected drug pushers would have it, but directly at those poisoning society with their substances, and not I stress with lethal intent,” Kaufman said.

“His rhetoric was calculated to arouse fear and obedience, to instill fear in their hearts, and to inculcate a respect for the law in their minds. Nothing more, nothing less. That was his intent and it was not criminal,” he added.

Kaufman argued that the evidence against Duterte was “wholly insufficient.”

“We will show you that the paltry number of speeches that the Prosecution rely do not manifest criminal intent,” he said.

“We will also convince you that as hard as they try, the prosecution’s investigators could not get even one of its criminal cooperating witnesses… to admit that they heard the former president Rodrigo Duterte give an order to kill,” he added.

The lawyer stressed that Duterte maintains his innocence.

“He stands behind his legacy resolutely. And he maintains his innocence absolutely,” he said. 

However, ICC Prosecutor and Senior Trial Lawyer Julian Nicholls said Duterte’s remarks were not bluster or hyperbole.

“The evidence as a whole, when you weigh it together, will show that what my friend said is not correct. That Mr. Duterte intended for his subordinates to follow the law, and that his speeches were simply bluster,” he said.

He also argued that Duterte tried to build a “veneer of plausible deniability” when he made his remarks on self-defense. 

“Those references on self-defense appear throughout Mr. Duterte’s speeches. They’re all over the place. We don’t run away from that. We don’t shy away from that. That’s part of our theory,” he said.

“The defense will say and they already have, that we’ve cherry picked the statements we showed you. But we have not,” he added.

Nicholls said the evidence showed that the claims were “nothing but nonsense.”

“Keep in mind, as mayor, he created a death squad. A leader who creates, leads, arms, and funds a death squad is not interested in due process or following the law,” he said.

“Those empty utterances were simply Mr. Duterte… Those were simply him acting as the former prosecutor, trying to build in some semblance of defense, preparing for the day should it ever come, as it now has, that he would be held to account,” he added.

Nicholls also cited Duterte’s remark during a House hearing, where he admitted that planting evidence was part of his strategy as a mayor.

He also noted that Duterte vowed to take accountability for the killings.

To recall, during a Senate hearing in October 2024, Duterte said that while he will not apologize for the drug war, he will take “full, legal responsibility” on the matter. 

The next hearings are scheduled on February 24, 26, and 27.

Based on government records, around 6,200 drug suspects were killed during the Duterte administration's anti-drug operations. Human rights organizations, however, say that the number may reach 30,000 due to the unreported related killings. —RF/JMA, GMA Integrated News