Corona properties: From 45 to just 5
Chief Justice Renato Corona owns only five of the 45 real estate properties originally listed by the Land Registration Authority ( LRA) as his and used as basis by prosecutors for their request for subpoena in the impeachment trial.
This was stressed by Co- rona’s lawyers on Day 33 of the trial at the Senate, which focused on establishing the real number of properties owned by the chief magistrate.
Defense lawyer Noel Lazaro emphasized that of the 45 properties mentioned by LRA administrator Eulalio Diaz Jr. in his letter to lead prosecutor Iloilo Rep. Niel Tupas, only five properties covered by six titles
belong to the Chief Justice.
The five properties were the ones disclosed in his statement of assets, liabilities and net worth (SALN) in 2010, the defense added.
During questioning, Carmina Cruz, client relations officer of Alveo Property, testified on the veracity of documents showing that Unit 31B of The Columns was “accepted” on Aug. 12, 2009 despite a letter informing Mrs. Corona that the unit was “deemed accepted” in June 2008.
Since payment of real property tax was collected from Mrs. Corona in 2008, Cruz said the property “according to our practice, may still be with the developer.”
She based her testimony on a document in an Excel file prepared by her office which showed two columns on the acceptance dates and “deemed acceptance dates” of the unit buyers.
“Just a quick question on both sides. Is it your theory that if a property has not yet been delivered and not yet fully owned by Corona, he may not declare it in his SALN?” Sen. Francis Escudero asked the defense panel.
“That depends, your honor. If what is involved is general delivery then the law on delivery will apply. But in cases of specific instances, then the very contract between the parties and the exchange of communication will be very enlightening as to whether actual physical possession had already been delivered to the buyer,” lead defense lawyer Serafin Cuevas said.
Escudero confronted Cuevas about the case of the Marikina property whose title remained under the name of Mrs. Cristina Corona even if the buyer Demetrio Vicente had bought the lots more than two decades ago.
“There is no parity of issues. In the case of the Marikina property, what we proved is that there was a sale,” Cuevas said.
“There is no parity of facts between this Vicente case…there is an existing property. In this particular instance, the contract to sell covers a property that still had to be constructed, practically it was a sell of the right,” Cuevas said.
Cuevas said there could be no transfer of property regarding the condominium unit at The Columns because no such property exists, “notwithstanding the payment…way back earlier than 2006.”
Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile asked if the defense actually thinks that there is no asset to be reported since nothing has yet been delivered or accepted.
“We have not gone that far, we were merely trying to solve the issue on whether he was already the owner so much so that he is under obligation to report it in his SALN,” Cuevas explained.
Sen. Miriam Santiago, for her part, accused Diaz of trying to incriminate Corona by submitting inaccurate documents to impeachment prosecutors.
Santiago accused Diaz of violating the Civil Code for coming up with the list.
Santiago cited a 1992 Supreme Court ruling to show that Diaz may have committed a “breach of duty by flagrant and palpable [and] gross negligence.”
“You didn’t even bother to go over each name carefully because you are a former Aquino employee or official and you knew already that President Aquino’s instruction to the House prosecution panel was to impeach the Chief Justice, yet you remain innocent of all these political developments, you just sent a list that you knew is going to incriminate the Chief Justice,” Santiago said.
“It didn’t appear to me that way,” Diaz answered.
“As for the liability of the prosecution, I ask you gentlemen to study your canons of judicial conduct, it is very clear from the jurisprudence that you are likewise in the same geographical position as your client, you are teetering on the brink of criminality,” Santiago said.
Diaz said it was the first time that they used the computer system to search for the properties of Corona in the National Capital Region. Diaz said they had prepared the document regarding Corona’s property even before House prosecutor Tupas requested for it.
Senators Ferdinand Marcos Jr., Loren Legarda and Pia Cayetano, however, said Diaz’s statements were confusing.
The defense panel said it was disturbed by the claim of Diaz that LRA discontinued its computerized information search system after providing prosecutors the list of Corona’s supposed properties.
“What the (LRA) administrator said yesterday was disturbing, that the search system was used only once and then it was terminated,” defense lawyer Jose Roy III said. “Can you imagine allocating government funds to create search engine and then after that it would be withdrawn hastily?” When asked if he thinks Malacañang had a hand in the release of the list of the 45 properties, Roy said: “I hope not. But if you’re asking me whether people suspect that it is Malacañang, I suppose there are people who suspect that it is Malacañang.”
Session day lost
Prosecutors, meanwhile, lamented the attention given to the list of Corona’s properties.
“I don’t understand this. We lost one session day for something that has no relevance (to the case). This was not even introduced by the prosecution as evidence,” Tupas said in Filipino.
He explained that the list of 45 “properties” allegedly owned by Corona and his family was merely submitted to the Senate as an annex to its request for subpoenas from the impeachment court.
“Almost every evidence that we submitted in our offer of evidence was already with us even before the letter from the LRA Administrator dated Jan. 10,” Tupas said.
“We just wanted to confirm (the properties) that’s why we asked for the list,” he added. Tupas said that the list of the LRA has no consequence on the evidence already presented.
“As a matter of evidence, it’s not an issue except for the five properties that the defense is disputing, which are under the names of the (Coronas’) children,” Tupas said.
Tupas also denied the allegation of Sen. Jinggoy Estrada that Diaz was in cahoots with the prosecution in the preparation and release of the list of properties.
As far as the presentation of the list to the media during a press conference held by the prosecution before the trial started, Tupas said that he was not present there and that their spokespersons only stated that there was a list of 45 properties.
“We reviewed it. There was a trace back, meaning there was always a relation to Corona. We were not sure about the 45. We were only certain about those that were under their names,” Tupas said. –