Prosecution 'certain' they have enough evidence vs. VP Sara

The House prosecution panel expressed confidence that they have enough evidence to prove Vice President Sara Duterte committed impeachable offenses, private prosecutor and House prosecution panel spokesperson Atty. Benjamin Tolosa, Jr. said Wednesday.

Tolosa was responding to Senator Pia Cayetano's social media post featuring a spliced video of Akbayan party-list Representative Chel Diokno speaking on the merits of opening the bank account records of Vice President Sara Duterte and her husband.

The video shows Diokno and Senator Alan Peter Cayetano, having an exchange with the caption, "Nagbabakasakali lang?" (Just taking a shot?).

Tolosa, maintained, that this is not the case.

“Congressman Diokno articulated this during the oral arguments: Hindi kami nagbabakasakali na may makita sa mga bank records dahil sigurado kami na merong importante impormasyon sa mga bank records na pinasubpoena namin sa impeachment court,” Tolosa said in a press conference.

(We are not putting up a shot in a dark here. We are certain that there is a meritorious information on the bank records that we wanted the Senate court to issue a subpoena for them.)

“Bakit kami sigurado? Dahil lumabas na yan sa AMLC reports kung saan nakita natin na may P6.7 billion financial transactions involved in the bank accounts of Vice President and her husband. So, hindi kami nagbabakasakali, alam namin mismo ano ang mga bank accounts, saan branch yan, dahil again nandun iyon sa AMLC reports,” Tolosa added.

(Why are we sure? Because AMLC reports showed that there is P6.7 billion financial transactions involving the bank accounts of the Vice President and her husband [Mans Carpio]. So, we are not taking a chance here. We know exactly the bank accounts involved,the bank branches, due to the AMLC report.

Tolosa was referring to the testimony of the Anti-Money Laundering Council (AMLC) Executive Director Ronel Buenaventura during the House justice committee deliberations on the impeachment complaints lodged against the Vice President wherein the AMLC official revealed that bank transactions totaling P6.7 billion—classified as covered and suspicious—were recorded under the names of Vice President Duterte and her husband, lawyer Manases Carpio.

The AMLC reports submitted to the committee include:

• Covered Transaction Reports and Suspicious Transaction Reports covering the period from 2006 to 2025; and
• Financial Intelligence Reports on Vice President Duterte and her husband, Manases Carpio, among others.

Of the total amount, P3.7 billion was attributed to the Vice President, while P2.998 billion was linked to Carpio.

The report also identified P791 million in transactions as having undetermined inflows and outflows.

“Vice President Sara Duterte’s accounts generated a total of 371 large transactions and 30 suspicious transactions from Oct. 13, 2005 to Jan. 28, 2026, with transaction amounts reaching as high as P55.158 million,” Buenaventura said, reading from the report submitted to the House justice panel.

During the House justice panel deliberations, the Office of the Ombudsman also revealed that the Vice President did not declare any cash on hand or in bank asset in her joint wealth statement with her husband from 2019 to 2024. —VAL, GMA News