Trillanes' Triad Accusation Against Vice Mayor Pulong Duterte Laughed Off

A good friend invited me to watch yesterday's Senate Blue Ribbon Committee hearing on the case of the P6 Billion shabu smuggling at the Bureau of Customs. 

I gladly obliged because my friend said we'd have front row seats to the thunderous fireworks that was expected to erupt following Senator Antonio Trillanes' much hyped threat to expose Davao City Vice Mayor Paolo Duterte's involvement in the illegal drugs trade.

To be honest, I haven't been following the Blue Ribbon Committee hearings. My interest in it had been pricked only after Senator Trillanes' threw an unruly fit during the orderly proceedings conducted by Blue Ribbon Comittee Chairman Sen. Richard Gordon.

Friends who knew that Gordon was my former boss at the Department of Tourism and the Senate messaged me on Facebook, saying that my former boss had just threatened to file an ethics complaint against Trillanes.

Trillanes stupidly tried to justify his disruptive behavior by claiming that Gordon was lawyering for the Dutertes and keeping them from being brought to the senate to be investigated by the Blue Ribbon Committee. 

A widely circulated transcript of the proceedings was a slap in the face of Trillanes.


In any case, this week, Gordon made good with his word to invite Vice Mayor Duterte and Atty. Mans Carpio to the hearing on the customs shabu smuggling case.

After going through the preliminaries of swearing in all the resource persons and organizing the proceedings, Gordon allowed Trillanes to freely question Vice Mayor Duterte on a number of things.

What happened next was an utterly disappointing display of Trillanes' habit of wantonly violating rules on how to properly address questions to senate resource persons.

First among the many instances that people found funny was his line of questioning regarding what he claims to be a tatoo on Vice Mayor Duterte's back.

For those of us who are not experts in the rules and procedures that govern senate investigations and the courts, it would be not be obvious that Trillanes' entire line of questioning trampled upon the rights of Vice Mayor Duterte whom he accused of being involved in the smuggling of illegal drugs.

Trillanes claims that the basis for his line of questioning regarding Vice Mayor Durterte's supposed tatoo was premised on an unknown document.

It was not first determined whether the document was a credible, truthful, and authentic source of information.

A lawyer friend whom I had talked with told me that in court, Trillanes' line of questioning would not have been allowed without first establishing the veracity of Trillanes' document. 

I am not at all sure why Gordon allowed Trillanes to go on with the line of questioning and it's something I want to take up with him because he's really great at explaining legal procedures -- whether in the senate or in court.

It was only later in the hearing that Senator Panfilo Lacson piped up and asked Trillanes to show the members of the committee  the document he had.  

In any case, the danger posed on those accused of crime by unverified documents is that these things may as well be fiction concocted for the sole purpose of accusing and shaming people.

For all we know, Trillanes might have just hired someone to write down a collection of rumors and branded it as intelligence.

Trillanes accusations boils down to this:

Triads have dragon tattoos. Trillanes claims that Vice Mayor Duterte has a dragon tattoo. Therefore, in Trillanes' mind, Vice Mayor Duterte is a member of the triad.

HOW IRRATIONAL! HOW REPUGNANTLY ABSURD!



Trillanes' Triad Accusation Against Vice Mayor Pulong Duterte Laughed Off Trillanes' Triad Accusation Against Vice Mayor Pulong Duterte Laughed Off Reviewed by PRF on 10:12 AM Rating: 5

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