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Aside from the impeached official, there are other key people involved in an impeachment trial. They can be classified into three: the House prosecutors, the defense team, and the senator-judges.
Select members of the House of Representatives present evidence and arguments to support charges, while a group of lawyers is tasked to defend the impeached official. Senators, meanwhile, sit as judges who have to weigh the evidence presented to the impeachment court and then decide on the official’s guilt or innocence.
The Philippines has had two impeachment trials so far. Former president Joseph “Erap” Estrada faced the impeachment court in the last quarter of 2000, while more than a decade later, in 2012, then-Supreme Court chief justice Renato Corona was tried and convicted for failing to fully disclose his financial assets. This made him the first high-ranking official to be removed via impeachment.
Estrada’s impeachment trial came to an abrupt end when House prosecutors walked out in protest, accusing the senator-judges of bias. The walkout became the tipping point that sparked the EDSA People Power II uprising, forcing Estrada to step down.
More than a decade after the Corona conviction, another high-stakes impeachment trial was supposed to happen in 2025. However, the Supreme Court halted the proceedings against Vice President Sara Duterte, citing due process violations and the one-year bar rule.
The Court clarified that a new impeachment case can only be filed starting February 2026. Vice President Duterte faces charges including betrayal of public trust, culpable violation of the Constitution, bribery, graft and corruption, and other high crimes.
Rappler looks into the composition of the House prosecutors and defense teams in the impeachment trials of Estrada, Corona, and what the had been prepared for the trial of Duterte.
Defense team: Who stands by the impeached official?
Impeached officials are entitled to a legal team tasked with defending them in a trial. These lawyers often reflect the official’s personal networks, law school affiliations, and trust circles.
Estrada’s lawyers were largely products of the University of the Philippines (UP) College of Law. The only exception was former senator Rene Saguisag, who was a graduate of San Beda Law.
Estrada’s team was a mix of legal heavyweights from different backgrounds: a former congressman (Raul Daza), a former senator (Rene Saguisag), a former Supreme Court chief justice (Andres Narvasa), a former Supreme Court associate justice (Serafin Cuevas), and a former UP Law dean (Pacifico Agabin).
Also in Estrada’s team were seasoned lawyers Jose Flaminiano and Estelito Mendoza, the latter famously known for being the “lawyer of last resort” for high-profile figures accused of plunder and corruption.
Corona, an Ateneo Law graduate, brought in a team dominated by fellow Ateneo alumni. A few members came from UP Law.
Corona’s lawyers included at least three members from the Romulo, Mabanta, Buenaventura, Sayoc & De Los Angeles law firm, namely, Eduardo de Los Angeles, Jacinto Jimenez, and Tranquil Gervacio Salvador III.
Cuevas made a second appearance in the impeachment court to represent Corona in 2012.
Sara Duterte’s defense team, meanwhile, reflects more diversity. Her counsels earned their law degrees from Ateneo, UP, Far Eastern University, and the University of San Carlos.
Two of them — Sheila Sison and Reynold Munsayac — studied in San Sebastian College, where the Vice President also earned her law degree. Both Sison and Munsayac were valedictorians of their respective batches. Munsayac was also Duterte’s law school classmate and former spokesperson.
“The diversity in the defense panel and the diversity in the prosecution panel mirrors the growth of schools other than UP and Ateneo in the legal landscape,” UP law professor Paolo Tamase said.
Duterte’s legal defense team stands out for two reasons: its size and composition.
With 12 lawyers, it’s the largest defense delegation in any Philippine impeachment trial so far. A majority of these lawyers come from a single firm — Fortun Narvasa & Salazar — a contrast to the individually assembled defense panels in past impeachments.
One of its founding partners, Gregorio Narvasa II, is the son of the late chief justice Narvasa, who was part of Estrada’s defense team. Duterte’s ties to the firm can be traced to two of its partners — Sison and Munsayac.
This shift — from star individual counsels to hiring a law firm — reflects broader changes in the legal profession, according to Tamase.
“That’s in line with trends also in the litigation sphere where you now have high-profile cases being handled by firms instead of abogado de campanilla as the old term would be,” Tamase said.
“With the way the trial is done now after the judicial affidavit rule in 2012, you need to be able to front-load a lot of the work of testimony, gathering, and case build-up at the beginning of a case. And it’s very hard for a single lawyer to do that, especially in complex cases. So firms are favored there in a sense where they have big teams,” he added.
The judicial affidavit rule is a reform measure adopted by the Supreme Court in 2012 to speed up court proceedings and reduce case backlogs.
In terms of gender representation, defense panels in all three impeachment cases were male-dominated. Estrada’s legal team was composed entirely of men. The lone woman in Corona’s defense team was Karen Jimeno, who also served as spokesperson. Duterte’s defense team is similarly male-dominated, with only four women among her 12 legal counsels.
House lawmakers: Who prosecutes the impeached?
In an impeachment trial, selected members of the House of Representatives take on the role of prosecutors.
Tamase underscored their crucial duty to prove that the accused is no longer fit for public office, a “very high bar,” given that impeachment is reserved for serious constitutional offenses.
Typically, these are lawmakers with a legal background.
“They should be able to navigate the complexities of the legal language, the presentation of evidence, questioning witnesses, and defending against the witnesses of the other side. So those are skills that lawyers are trained in,” Tamase said.
The House prosecutors in the impeachment trials came from different law schools.
The majority of House prosecutors in the previous impeachment trials were male: nine out of 10 for Estrada, and eight out of 10 for Corona.
In Duterte’s upcoming impeachment trial, there are three congresswomen sitting as prosecutors: Batangas 2nd District Representative Gerville Luistro, Mamamayang Liberal Party-list Representative Leila de Lima, and San Juan City Representative Bel Zamora.
Under the 19th Congress, women lawmakers occupied only 86 out of the 317 seats in the House of Representatives, based on the count of the Inter-Parliamentary Union in 2024.
In an impeachment trial, it’s the senators who decide the outcome. But both the House prosecutors and the defense panel play equally crucial roles.
Regardless of changes in background or trends, how both sides present their arguments and tell their side of the story can greatly influence the course and eventual outcome of the trial. – Rappler.com
