Defense not worried by exposure of Corona bank accounts

MANILA, Philippines – While some details of Chief Justice Renato Corona’s multi-million-peso bank accounts have been discussed at his impeachment trial in the Senate, his lawyers claim they’re not a bit worried about the implications.

“We are not alarmed. The manner of the scrutiny and the opening of the bank accounts reaffirm our position that they had no evidence when they filed the complaint before the Senate,” defense lawyer Tranquil Salvador said of the prosecution.

Besides, Salvador added, none of the records on Corona’s accounts with Philippine Savings Bank and the Bank of the Philippine Islands has been formally offered in evidence, and in the end, it would boil down to whether these are admissible.

“We can explain all this when our turn comes. Is it possible for the spouses to have intermingling of funds? We have to recognize that there will be intermingling of funds. Remember this family worked, too. They were not poor; they were not indigent,” he said in a telephone interview.

Prosecutors last week presented bank officials as witnesses to highlight gaps left by Corona in his statements of assets, liabilities and net worth (SALNs) which they claimed he did not timely, accurately and truthfully disclose to the public.

The bank managers testified that Corona had a P12-million balance in his checking account with BPI branch on Ayala Avenue in Makati as of December 2010, and P24.6 million with the PSBank branch on Katipunan Avenue in Quezon City between 2007 and 2010.

The prosecutors said Corona declared only P3.5 million in cash or investments in his 2010 SALN.

The impeachment court has subpoenaed anew BPI branch manager Annabelle Tiongson to testify on Corona’s peso deposits on Monday.

Salvador admitted that the defense indirectly benefited from the Supreme Court order temporarily restraining the impeachment court from compelling PSBank officials to disclose records on Corona’s alleged dollar accounts in accordance with the Foreign Currency Deposit Act which prohit inquiries into foreign currency deposits.

“It’s an incidental benefit. But it’s not our victory but the victory of the PSBank and the banking industry,” he said.

Meanwhile, Senator Antonio Trillanes IV belied claims that the subpoena issued by the impeachment court for the opening of Corona’s alleged dollar accounts would result in loss of privacy of bank deposits and adversely affect the banking system.

“First of all, the exception from the bank and foreign currency deposit secrecy laws which will result from the implementation of the subpoena will apply to a handful of impeachable officials only and specifically in impeachment cases only,” he said in a statement.

Under the Constitution, only the President, the Vice President, members of the Supreme Court, the Ombudsman, and the chairpersons and commissioners of constitutional commissions can be impeached, Trillanes said.

Investors, corporations, private businesses and private individuals and even ordinary officials and rank-and-file government employees would not be affected since they are not impeachable officers, he said.

“At the end of the day, only corrupt, high-ranking government officials can potentially be affected by the precedent created by the impeachment court’s ruling.  This should in fact be a welcome development because the law should never be a refuge for those engaged in corruption and other criminal activities,” he said.