PSBank president denies being source of leaked documents

MANILA, Philippines – The president of the Philippine Savings Bank (PSBank) denied that it  was the source of documents the prosecution team had used to request for the records of several bank accounts allegedly owned by Chief Justice Renato Corona.

“Those documents floating around did not come from us,” said Pascual Garcia III when he testified before the Senate, sitting as an impeachment court, on Thursday.

The Senate showed Garcia some documents submitted by the prosecution team to the chamber to determine whether they were genuine or fake.

“Your honor this is a xerox copy, this is not original…just offhand, there seems to be some differences,” said the witness, responding to queries of Senate President Juan Ponce-Enrile, the presiding officer.

“Where did it come then? From heaven?” asked Enrile, to which Garcia answered, “I don’t know.”

When Garcia pointed out that the documents where photo copies of the original, the Senate leader ordered the witness to bring the original to the Senate.

“Then you produce the original so we can compare,” he said.

Enrile said the prosecution team has a “lot of things to answer for this” if the documents they submitted to the chamber would not match with the original.

The prosecutors said the documents that they attached in their request to subpoena bank officials and records came from an anonymous source.

But when Enrile enumerated the 10 account numbers that the PSBank official had previously identified in the name of Corona, the witness confirmed that these accounts existed.

“The only conclusion is that this leak came from the Katipunan [PSBank branch],” Enrile said.

Garcia said, “Your honor, I honestly believe it did not.”