Sara Duterte impeachment trial: Chel Diokno arguments please the ‘cheldren’

LIKE FATHER. Counsel for the prosecution Rep. Chel Diokno makes a manifestation during day six of the impeachment trial of Vice President Sara Duterte on July 15, 2026. Nino Jesus Orbeta/Pool via SPPA Incidentally, the defense team of the late ex-chief justice Renato Corona also used the same Stonehill vs Diokno case to show he was being unjustly prosecuted Day 7 of the Sara Duterte impeachment trial on Monday, July 20, showed what a court veteran is made of: quick to the draw, armed with depth and decorum, poised for balls thrown from left field. Many forget that Akbayan Representative Chel Diokno spent decades defending the prosecuted, thus priming him for the roadblocks that a well-oiled defense team will throw his way. The “cheldren” — his youth base when he ran — must have been pleased. The Senate courtroom on Monday looked and sounded different, the sing-song cadence of Diokno and defense counsel Michael Poa filling the air. Here were two opposing lawyers standing their ground without flipping their heads or clenching their fists, telling us in clear language what the laws on bank and tax records mean to privacy and public accountability. Even the Cayetano siblings tried to temper their tone. “I recognize that you’re a brilliant man, learned in law,” Senator-judge Alan Peter Cayetano told Diokno, before he grilled the former human rights lawyer with questions not about Ms. Duterte, but about President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. If the assets records of the Vice President that span decades could be opened for this trial, why did the House committee that looked into the Marcos impeachment complaint not impose the same on him? For a moment there, Diokno appeared surprised by the curveball query, but with clasped hands he brought Cayetano down to earth. Watch it here. The Cayetanos — two lawyers whose father was also a senator and lawyer — were given the floor to puncture the prosecution’s plea for the impeachment court to subpoena Duterte’s bank and tax records, as well as that of her husband, lawyer Mans Carpio. They zeroed in on two doctrines on why this should not be granted: the “fruit of the poisonous tree” and “fishing expedition.” On both topics, they gave Diokno a nasty jab by citing a landmark 1967 Supreme Court case that ruled against his venerable father, then-justice minister Jose Wright Diokno. What Senator Pia Cayetano was trying to say, in effect, was, didn’t your father lose that case because he searched and seized items of American businessman Harry Stonehill on the basis of a “general warrant” that the High Tribunal eventually declared unconstitutional? One could not have asked a better man to address the difference between a subpoena and a search warrant; he had spent a lifetime in the trenches questioning illegal raids and searches committed against his impoverished clients. Chel Diokno would not be baited into defending a father who did not need defending, and gave a quick lecture on why a subpoena is “not a license,” while a search warrant is “invasive” and open to abuse — and that they are governed by different sets of rules. Watch it here. Stonehill and Corona Incidentally, the defense team of the late dismissed chief justice Renato Corona also used the same Stonehill argument in its opening statement during his 2012 impeachment trial. Corona’s lead defense counsel then, Eduardo delos Angeles, cited the case to explain how then-president Noynoy Aquino was using his power to bring down Corona. “The Stonehill case is strikingly similar to the crusade of President Aquino. In both, there are crusading officials who want to eliminate corruption. In both, the public overwhelmingly support these officials. In both, the officials unfortunately transgressed the Constitution,” he said. Duterte’s defense team is adamant in its stand that to subpoena the bank and tax records of its client from years even before she became vice president was tantamount to a “fishing expedition.” Counsel Poa also cited the “absolute prohibition” in the anti-money laundering law regarding the public release of bank transactions. What’s the point of the prosecution in asking for them, asked Poa? “Transactions do not equate to wealth or net worth.” Watch it here. The fishing expedition is “baka sakali, on the off-chance,” countered Diokno, an argument that is “untenable,” given the amount of public records that the prosecution has submitted to bolster their case before the court. Watch it here. At stake on Monday was the very foundation — in the form of government records — of the House prosecution’s charge that the Vice President had amassed unexplained wealth. The court ruled in favor of issuing subpoenas to the critical agencies holding such records: the Bureau of Internal Revenue and the Anti-Money Laundering Council. It’s a long way to go, as we spelled out in this story, but a big win nonetheless because, in the words of former Erap Estrada impeachment prosecutor Oscar Moreno, bank records do not lie. Before the court went to the business of the day, Senator Erwin Tulfo made an impassioned plea for the senator-judges to avoid raising issues not related to the case. The senators seem to have heeded it. But Day 8, Tuesday, July 21, promises to raise the temperature again, because of the man of the house: prosecution witness Melvin Matibag, director of the National Bureau of Investigation, whose team attempted to arrest the now fugitive Senator Bato dela Rosa during the May chaos in the Senate and who has started a probe into Alan Cayetano’s alleged questionable acts as government lead in the 2019 Southeast Asian Games held here. – Rappler.com How does this make you feel? Loading