The Philippine Online Chronicles

The Senate impeachment court blocked on Wednesday the presentation of documents on Chief Justice Renato Corona’s alleged ill-gotten wealth, on the assertion that the accusation should be proven by evidence and not by suspicion.

Senate president and presiding judge Juan Ponce Enrile said in a report that the court has decided to bar the introduction of paragraph 2.4 of Article 2 of the impeachment complaint, which had caused the impeachment proceedings to drag on for days.

Article 2.4 of the complaint states that Corona was “suspected and accused of having accumulated ill-gotten wealth, [and of] acquiring assets of high values and keeping bank accounts with huge deposits.”

In its memorandum, the defense panel argued that the House prosecution panel was injecting an entirely new charge into Article 2 by including the issue of ill-gotten wealth. Article 2 is on the alleged failure of Corona to disclose to the public his Statement of Assets, Liabilities and Net Worth (SALN).

Enrile said the Article 2 of the impeachment complaint had been “expanded” by the prosecution from its original allegation.

But he said in a separate interview after Wednesday’s session that the chief justice is not yet off the hook on the accusation of ill-gotten wealth.

Enrile said the prosecution should be able to prove that Corona left several properties out of his SALN before reaching the conclusion of ill-gotten wealth.

Income and assets don’t match

Meanwhile, Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR) Kim Henares revealed during Wednesday’s session that the declared income of Corona and his wife Corona did not match the records of their asset acquisitions.

Henares said in her testimony that Corona’s wife was able to acquire a P11-million property in La Vista subdivision in Quezon City in 2003 despite having no reported source of income.

The BIR chief also disclosed that the couple brought a property on Katipunan Avenue worth P2.5 million in 2003, and sold lots at La Vista and Pansol, Quezon City in 2010.

Henares said Corona earned a combined gross income of P2.837 million from 2006 to 2010. She explained that the BIR has no copy of Corona’s income tax returns for 2002 to 2005 since the high court did not file its alpha list, which details an office personnel’s salaries and taxes withheld, for those years.

Prosecution spokesman Marikina Rep. Miro Quimbo said in a report that the “big disparity” in Corona’s income and assets acquired “is considered ill-gotten wealth.”

The BIR chief said after the trial that Corona’s wife may face a separate investigation by the bureau over her purchase of a P11-million property despite having no declared source of income.