How prosecution got Corona’s bank record deserves own probe

The story of how copies of Chief Justice Renato Corona’s bank documents reached House prosecutors has gotten so complicated that one senator believes it now warrants its own Senate investigation.

Sen. Antonio Trillanes IV told the Inquirer that Quezon City Rep. Jorge “Bolet” Banal’s claim that he found copies of Corona’s bank records left outside his house was now “completely off the main case” of the Chief Justice’s alleged impeachable offenses and better left to the scrutiny of the Senate committee on banks, financial institutions and currencies.

Sen. Panfilo Lacson said the determination of the criminal culpability of prosecutors and assistants who used illegal means to obtain bank documents was outside the jurisdiction of the impeachment court. But he noted that a “more relevant question” facing the senators was whether to admit the questioned testimonies and documents when these were eventually offered as evidence by the prosecution.

Lacson volunteered in a text message that according to his own research, “illegally acquired evidence is governed by the exclusionary rule on its admissibility.”

He and other senators agreed that Banal’s story raised more questions but that they would rather hear what he had to say on Monday.

Shocked manager

Annabelle Tiongson, manager of the Philippine Savings Bank (PSBank) branch on Katipunan Avenue, Quezon City, told the impeachment court that Banal visited her in her office on Jan. 31 and sought her help in verifying a photocopy of Corona’s bank records.

She said Banal, a former Quezon City councilor, even told her that he was “a congressman already,” and that he was “part of the secretariat” in pursuit of Corona’s bank accounts.

Tiongson said she was shocked by the records Banal showed her that after he left, she went to the bank’s vault to check if Corona’s signature cards were still inside.

“[But] this issue should be the subject of a committee hearing and not an impeachment trial. This subject is completely off the main case,” Trillanes said in a text message, adding that the impeachment court’s present focus on determining the source of the documents was “irrelevant.”

“The more appropriate venue for this line of questioning is a committee hearing,” he said.

Still, Trillanes said, he would not agree with “any decision that will make [Corona’s] peso accounts inadmissible as evidence” just because of doubts raised on the authenticity of the documents.

It was Tiongson who initially said that the copies of Corona’s records presented by the prosecution “seem fake.”

Let him talk

Senators Vicente Sotto III, Loren Legarda and Francis Pangilinan also said they believed that Banal should be given the chance to air his story in open court on Monday.

Banal has been “invited,” instead of summoned, by Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile as a gesture of interparliamentary courtesy.

But he told the impeachment court on Thursday that an anonymous sender left a copy of Corona’s dollar records outside his house at St. Ignatius Village in Quezon City, and confirmed that he had shown Tiongson the documents.

“I’m sorry if I caused any problem. I just wanted to help our team,” Banal said.

It was Legarda who pointed out that while Banal got the copy on Jan. 31, Mindoro Rep. Reynaldo Umali, a member of the prosecution, said a “small lady” gave him copies of Corona’s bank records in the Senate premises on Feb. 2.

Asked on Friday if Banal’s story had complicated the issue of the bank documents, Legarda said: “Let’s take his word for it and let him explain on Monday.”

Sotto sent a similar reply by text message: “We hope to be clarified on Monday.”

Pangilinan said the origin and authenticity of the bank documents should be resolved immediately “so we can get back in harness, so to speak, and focus on the trial proper.”

Chaff from the grain

In another phone interview, Legarda said the Senate impeachment court was at a loss over the real source of the bank documents attached by the prosecution to its request for the subpoena issued by the court on Feb. 6 for Corona’s bank records.

She said she and her colleagues should be able to “separate the chaff from the grain” and focus on the meat of the impeachment case, which was Corona’s fitness to continue discharging his duties as Chief Justice. With reports from TJ Burgonio and Norman Bordadora