Day 2 of Duterte’s pre-trial

THE HAGUE, Netherlands – The second day of the affirmation of expenses listening to on the Worldwide Prison Court docket (ICC) was spent on the prosecution laying down how they’ll hyperlink particular incidents of killings to former Philippine president Rodrigo Duterte, the alleged oblique co-perpetrator.

Day 2 was devoted to the submissions on deserves of the prosecution and the victims’ representatives. Day 3 on Thursday, February 26 would be the flip of protection counsel Nicholas Kaufman to make his submission on deserves.

Insider witnesses

For the primary time, we noticed extra particulars on the insider witnesses that the prosecution has readily available. They’re nonetheless unidentified at this level, however trial lawyer Edward Jeremy no less than confirmed they have been insider witnesses who have been aware about the internal operation of the Philippine Nationwide Police’s Oplan Tokhang. Tokhang, from the Visayan phrases, knock (tok) and plead (hangyo), was the catchphrase of the Duterte administration’s conflict on medication.

One of many testimonies Jeremy introduced was an insider witness saying that Oplan Tokhang targets “needed to be poor – those that do not need the means to file a criticism or to complain.”

That we are able to now affirm there are insider witnesses within the conflict on medication is critical. Beforehand, we solely reported on two witnesses who have been insiders of the Davao Dying Squad.

 “You’ve gotten heard yesterday and the day earlier than an essential phrase for us, which is ‘insider.’ The insider is somebody who was within the circle of Mr. Duterte  and who turned a prosecution witness,” stated Paolina Massidda, the international lawyer of the ICC’s Workplace of the Public Counsel for Victims or OPCV.

The OPCV is just like the Public Legal professional’s Workplace within the Philippines. The protection equal is the OPCD or the Workplace of the Public Counsel for the Defence.

Methodology to insanity

An essential factor the prosecution should show is Duterte’s hyperlink to particular incidents within the expenses.

Jeremy introduced a methodical hyperlink starting with Duterte’s public speeches. For instance, Jeremy introduced video clips of Duterte threatening that he would kill Albuera Metropolis, Leyte mayor Rolando Espinosa, and Ozamiz Metropolis mayor Reynaldo Parojinog.

The prosecution obtained an excel sheet containing the mayors’ names, included in what Duterte referred to as again then as “narco listing.” It’s additionally referred to as the PRRD listing, or the President Rodrigo Roa Duterte listing.

Espinosa and Parojinog have been each killed in police operations.

Then, Jeremy confirmed that after the killings, the mayors’ names have been marked within the excel sheet as “neutralized.” It was Jeremy’s approach to show that neutralize meant to kill, and never what the Duterte authorities stated as being open to interpretation. (Neutralize, Duterte officers stated, might additionally imply to disarm, or detain.)

Espinosa, for one, was not marked neutralized when he was arrested and jailed. He was marked neutralized after his loss of life.

“Notably, one insider witness defined the importance of using this phrase, neutralize, on this command memorandum. The witness said as follows: ‘they used the phrase neutralize to emphasise the kill order of president Duterte’,” Jeremy stated.

Jeremy was referring to police round No. 16-2016 issued by then-police chief and now Senator Ronald “Bato” Dela Rosa to operationalize Oplan Tokhang in 2016. Dela Rosa has been named by the prosecution as co-perpetrator, though there’s no affirmation if arrest warrants had been sought towards them. Warrants will be underneath seal, or in secret, till carried out per new ICC guidelines.

Does it quantity to crimes towards humanity?

Within the ICC, the prosecution has to determine what mode of felony legal responsibility is getting used towards the suspect. As a result of Duterte didn’t pull the set off and was not the one who truly killed the victims within the expenses, he’s charged as an oblique co-perpetrator.

To be an oblique co-perpetrator, the Rome Statute underneath Article 25 3(a) says the suspect have to be confirmed to commit the crime “whether or not as a person, collectively with one other or by means of one other particular person, no matter whether or not that different particular person is criminally accountable.”

Trial lawyer Robyn Croft introduced this authorized principle to the judges, saying that “Mr. Duterte not directly co-perpetrated the crimes, ordered and or induced the crimes and or assist and abetted the crimes.”

“First, he agreed to a typical plan to neutralize alleged criminals. Second, he and his fellow co-perpetrators collectively managed a construction of energy, specifically the Davao Dying Squad and the Nationwide Community, which they used to pursue the frequent plan. Third, Mr. Duterte made an important contribution to the crimes inside the framework of the frequent plan. And fourth, he did this with the requisite intent,” stated Croft.

The nationwide community refers back to the conflict on medication when he was president of the nation.

How did the prosecution do?

For the previous Duterte Cupboard members who’re in The Hague, banking on the phrase “neutralize” is a recycled authorized principle.

“Each time he utters the phrase kill, it solely means one factor: that he’ll run after, hunt these concerned within the drug syndicate and different criminals to the ends of the earth, and prosecute them and put them behind bars. That’s what the phrase kill means, not the literal that means of murdering folks,” stated Salvador Panelo, Duterte’s former presidential authorized counsel who helped him withdraw the Philippines from the ICC in 2018, made efficient in 2019.

However for Massidda, it’s not sufficient to say that Duterte’s phrases shouldn’t be taken actually.

“And there’s jurisprudence, by the best way, on the court docket, in relation to this type of phrases, as a result of neutralized, it’s not the primary time that it’s getting used… There’s jurisprudence of the court docket on the interpretation of those sort of phrases, that are usually interpreted within the context wherein they have been pronounced,” stated Massidda.

There are pending petitions within the Philippine Supreme Court docket that search to declare the conflict on medication unconstitutional. One of many two petitions was truly filed by the group of Joel Butuyan and Gilbert Andres, who have been appointed by the court docket as frequent authorized representatives for drug conflict victims, together with Massidda.

A Supreme Court docket choice on the phrase neutralize “would have helped,” stated Butuyan.

“There are such a lot of police statements which you could cull the that means of neutralized as a language utilized by the police. And it’s actually killing and bodily elimination,” stated Butuyan.

– Rappler.com