Luistro looking forward to defense's evidence at impeachment pre-trial

House Lead Impeachment Prosecutor Representative Gerville Luistro on Wednesday said she is looking forward to the pre-trial conference scheduled on June 18 at the Senate, as this will be the first time the prosecution will learn what evidence the defense panel will be presenting in the impeachment trial of Vice President Sara Duterte.

The defense and prosecution panels have also been served a notice by the Senate Impeachment court to submit their pre-trial briefs no later than June 15.

"Actually, the significance really of this upcoming pre-trial conference and even the final pre-trial brief is, is yung nilu-look forward namin na makikita na namin at least yung list of evidence ng respondent vice president," Luistro said in an online interview today.

"You will remember, from the 19th Congress to the Justice Committee of the 20th Congress and to their answer to the present impeachment case before the impeachment court, wala silang dinisclose [they did not disclose] even a single piece of evidence or even the name of witnesses. Walang nabanggit sa answer [Nothing mentioned in the answer]. And that is why we are really looking forward na mag-submit sila ng [to their submitting their] pre-trial brief where we are supposed to see all these names and documents," she added.

Luistro, who also chairs the House Committee on Justice, also explained that only evidence and witnesses presented during the pre-trial conference can be presented during the impeachment trial.

"Kasi ang liwanag dito eh, na kapag hindi yan prinesent [What's clear is, if they are not presented] during pre-trial conference, they cannot be presented during the trial. I believe that they have evidence. But this evidence needs to be presented and pre-marked during the pre-trial conference. And if ever they will be disclosing really this through their pre-trial brief, then this will be the first time for us that we will be seeing the evidence of the Vice President," she stated.

Several members of the House Prosecution Panel have repeatedly stated that they are confident of securing a conviction from the impeachment court based on the evidence that the panel has.

But Luistro says they can better assess the value of the prosecution panel's evidence once they see the evidence that the defense panel will present.

"Of course, mahalaga yon [that's important]. Because we can actually weigh the probative value of our evidence vis-a-vis that of the defense if we will be able to see the list of witnesses and documents to be presented during the trial by the defense. Ma-assess mo lang yung lakas ng ebidensiya mo [You will only be able to assess the strength of your evidence] upon seeing the evidence to be presented by the opposing party," she explained.

Luistro and another impeachment prosecutor, San Juan City Representative Ysabel Maria Zamora, said the prosecution panel has prepared pre-trial briefs for every article of impeachment. These briefs will be reviewed and consolidated for submission on June 15.

"I'm sorry but we cannot publicize the contents of our pre-trial brief. The least I can say perhaps is, andoon pa rin naman kami sa [we are still at] more or less 25 witnesses. The documents are indeed voluminous, especially for the confidential fund. We are just trying to determine now, alin ba talaga yung kailangan, alin yung pwedeng hindi na kasi corroborative lang, at marami ng significant corroborative pieces of evidence. [We are just trying to determine now which ones are necessary, which can be discarded as being only corroborative, and there's a lot of corroborative pieces of evidence.] But as to the stipulations for admission, we cannot disclose that. Perhaps let's wait until the pre-trial brief is filed on Monday," Luistro said.

No surprise witnesses

"For the two articles that I am handling, we have few witnesses who were not invited in the Justice hearing. So witnesses may be decided by the team depending on how their discussions are going so far. As of now, we are still discussing, we are still interviewing witnesses, we are still debating on whether one witness should go before another. Our presentation of witnesses is not yet final when we will be on direct," Zamora said in a separate online interview.

Zamora is assigned to the articles on the alleged bribery by Duterte of several officials of the Department of Education, and the threats against President Ferdinand "Bongbong" Marcos Jr., First Lady Liza Marcos, and former House Speaker Martin Romualdez.

Both Luistro and Zamora said that the House Prosecution Panel will not have surprise witnesses.

"The reason why we are disclosing all this information during pre-trial conference is we wanted to make sure that there will be no surprises during the trial and that the impeachment case or the Articles of Impeachment will really be resolved on the basis of evidence and not on technicalities," Luistro explained.

Luistro also stated that they will include hostile witnesses.

"The list that we can say is we are considering the officials of DepEd and OVP to be presented as hostile witnesses. Why hostile? Because their interest, of course, is adverse to the prosecution. Hindi lang dahil sila'y officials ng agencies which is being headed by the respondent vice president but because it is evident that the interest of these officials are adverse to the prosecution," Luistro said.

The House Prosecution Panel is also considering listing witnesses and documents where they have reservations.

"I think we will be having reservation not only for witnesses, but even for documents. This is because during the presentation of evidence, there might be relevant witnesses and evidence na kakailanganin i-present. So long as they are relevant and the necessary reservation was made in accordance with this notice of pre-trial brief, so I think that will be allowed by the Impeachment Court," Luistro stated.

"One possibility also is the banks. we don't know yet the names and also there is a possibility that the documents are not yet available as of this time. By the time of the filing of the pre-trial brief, wala pang availability na nakikita ang prosecution with regards to corresponding or necessary documents. So pagka ganyan, dapat merong reservation doon sa pre-trial brief," she added. — BM, GMA News