THE House prosecution team would not spring a surprise witness or evidence on the defense during the Senate impeachment trial of Vice President Sara Z. Duterte, prosecutor Ysabel Maria Zamora of San Juan said Monday.
Zamora made the statement in response to a question that the Vice President’s defense lawyers might resort to technicalities by questioning the presentation of new witnesses or pieces of evidence.
“We have been saying that all the evidence that we will be presenting are all either noted in the articles (of impeachment), those that were presented during the Committee on Justice hearings and all other relevant evidence that is in fact stated in the rules of the Representatives on impeachment proceedings,” Zamora told a news conference.
“So everything will be relevant, everything will be related to the allegations or the articles of impeachment,” she said.
Zamora said the names of witnesses and the evidence the prosecution would present during the trial would be detailed in a pre-trial brief the prosecution is scheduled to submit Monday to the Senate impeachment court, except those covered by certain reservations the prosecution would make.
“Now we have our pre-trial brief that we will be submitting today, Nakalagay naman po lahat diyan except those that will be made under reservation that we will make, but there will be at least a general description of all of evidence that we will present,” she said.
“So we follow the general rule that there will be no surprise witnesses or surprise evidence. We will lay out in our pre-trial brief all of the evidence that we will present,” she stressed.
For her part, lead prosecutor Rep. Gerville Luistro of Batangas said the House could still resort to “compulsory processes” like the issuance of subpoenas in the court of the impeachment trial for the production of evidence and for compelling witnesses to testify before the impeachment court.
“That is very much sanctioned by the Constitution. The purpose of this compulsory process is to aid the Senate during the trial,” she said.
She recalled that during its hearings on the impeachment complaints against the Vice President, the committee on justice which she chairs used its subpoena powers.
“It is therefore very much legal, lawful, valid for both the House and the Senate to exercise this compulsory process for the production documents and for compelling witnesses even when this evidence (was) not part of the articles of the impeachment complaints or the articles of impeachment,” Zamora said.
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