ICC prosecution asks dismissal of Rody Duterte bid to cap evidence

The International Criminal Court (ICC) prosecution has asked Trial Chamber III to dismiss former President Rodrigo Duterte’s motion seeking to limit the evidence in his case to 10,000 items.

In a 16-page document dated October 5, the prosecution said much of the defense’s motion focused on complaints about the volume, relevance and quality of the prosecution’s disclosure.

“The Chamber should reject this request for two reasons. First, this proposal would necessarily require the removal of the [redacted] dataset, which as explained below, is highly relevant to this case,” it said.

“Second, setting an arbitrary cap on the number of documents the Prosecution can disclose would automatically place the Prosecution in violation of its disclosure obligations as it would require the Prosecution to withhold evidence that it considers material to the Defense’s preparation,” it added.

The prosecution argued that it is the defense’s responsibility to review the evidence to prepare for trial.

“The Defence has repeatedly demonstrated its reluctance to begin this work in earnest despite significant assistance from the Prosecution that goes well beyond the scope of its obligations,” it said.

“It has instead spent its time collating complaints, that when placed in their proper context, are of limited impact,” it added.

The prosecution said it has taken active steps to address the disclosure issues and has presented the defense with multiple practical, reasonable and proportionate ways to manage the dataset.

However, it said the defense rejected all of these proposals.

According to the prosecution, the dataset contains 44,495 of the 62,034 items disclosed in the case and 8,812 of the 19,241 items included on the prosecution’s List of Evidence.

It said the dataset is highly relevant to Duterte’s case.

“The dataset is large because it records the deaths of the thousands of individuals killed by the PNP in anti-illegal drug operations, as well as the deaths of other drug personalities, while Mr Duterte was President," it said.

"The Prosecution relies on this, in part, to prove the widespread and systematic attack against the civilian population,” the prosecution added.

The prosecution further argued that the fact that the dataset includes deaths that remain under investigation does not make the information any less relevant.

It also rejected the defense’s claims about the quality of its disclosure, saying these were inaccurate.

“However, the Defence’s submission that the Prosecution’s disclosure is ‘appalling’ is incorrect. The examples provided by the Defence are replete with mischaracterisation, and leave the impression that the Defence has spent more time searching for problems to present to the Chamber than commencing a proper review of the material in order to prepare for trial,” it said.

The prosecution also disputed the defense's characterization of certain disclosed files as “floating documents” or “floating pages,” or materials that could not be clearly linked to a particular evidentiary item.

It said one example cited by the defense consisted of three separate photographs.

“Given the circumstances, it would not be appropriate for the Prosecution to combine three distinct, even potentially unrelated, photographs as one ERN,” it said.

It likewise said the 350 pages of documents cited by the defense were standalone media files.

“The Defence also failed to mention that the Prosecution has clearly indicated in the disclosure notes that these pages are near duplicates of a separate document that has been disclosed with one ERN, translated, and provided to the Defence,” it said.— MCG, GMA News

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