TRANQUIL SALVADOR III
The defense has appealed to the media to be more circumspect in their reportage on the impeachment trial of Chief Justice Renato Corona and the handling of the documents pertaining to his supposed questionable wealth.
“We’re not angry at the media as what some reports claimed. That’s why we’re asking for your help … Let’s be accurate in the reporting,” Tranquil Salvador III, one of Corona’s defense lawyers, told reporters after Wednesday’s proceedings.
“We’re humbly asking you not to bring [up] this case in the media, especially the issue about the SALNs (statements of assets, liabilities and net worth),” he said.
Trial by publicity
Salvador said the spread of digital copies of Corona’s SALNs in the Internet might further fuel the public’s negative perception of their client.
He said Internet users, including the youth who may not fully understand the difference between the assessed value and fair market value of properties and entries in Corona’s income tax returns, “may conclude” that the Chief Justice had indeed amassed ill-gotten wealth.
“But we know that since the Chief Justice sits in other special committees [in the Supreme Court], he may be receiving allowances like any other public official,” Salvador said.
Another defense lawyer, Karen Jimeno, denounced the House prosecutors for their supposed failure to comply with the order of Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile for both parties to stop discussing the merits of the case in public.
She said that in presenting evidence of Corona’s purported ill-gotten properties to the media, the prosecution was resorting to trial by publicity.
“We’re really alarmed that the prosecutors are ignoring the stern warning of [the presiding officer] not to disclose and discuss the merits of case outside the court. These should only be presented before the court and the senator-judges,” Jimeno said.
“But the prosecutors are continuing to present in public their purported evidence, which the court has yet to scrutinize. The Chief Justice’s reputation is already tarnished even before the trial is concluded,” she said.
Scorecard
Jose Roy III, also a defense lawyer, urged the media to avoid treating Corona’s impeachment trial like a basketball game by concluding which side won and scored in a particular trial day.
According to Roy, keeping a scorecard of the proceedings will only distract the public and take its attention away from the “real essence” of the trial.
“By doing that, the public will tend to look for the sensational part of the trial. It just distracts the people,” he told the Philippine Daily Inquirer.
Asked if the media coverage of the trial had been fair, Roy replied: “There’s no fairness here because this is a trial.
“Fairness will be only shown if nobody will meddle with this. The people will just go [to the Senate] and watch the trial as it happens. That’s fairness.”