The defense of former president Rodrigo Duterte has asked the International Criminal Court to order additional medical tests to determine whether he is mentally fit to stand trial, saying the recent assessment failed to resolve concerns over his “cognitive impairments.”
The request came after a court-appointed panel of experts submitted its joint and individual reports on Duterte’s fitness for trial. The prosecution said the experts’ reports showed that Duterte was fit to stand trial.
In a Sept. 14 filing, defense lead counsel Peter Haynes said Duterte’s examination showed “significant memory impairment” that prevents him from retaining recent information and reliably recalling past events.
“This makes it difficult for him to engage meaningfully with the charges, the alleged incidents, the tens of thousands of disclosed items of evidence, let alone give proper instructions to his lead counsel, whose name he only sometimes remembers,” Haynes said.
The defense pointed to two experts’ interviews with Duterte, saying these continued to show problems with his memory and orientation.
According to the filing, Duterte believed he was living in 2007 or 2008, could not identify some family members, gave an incorrect age for himself, and failed to recall recent visits from relatives.
Haynes said the experts attributed these results to Duterte’s “underperformance” during the tests but did not adequately determine whether this was due to a lack of motivation or an underlying neurological condition.
The defense then asked the Trial Chamber III to order a neurologist to conduct further examinations and require the panel of experts to consider the results in its final evaluation.
“This would allow the experts to confirm or exclude, once and for all, the possibility that his performance was the result of his failing to apply himself fully and would allow the trial chamber to interpret their final assessments on a properly informed basis,” the defense said in its filing.
If the chamber rejects the request for further testing, the defense said the parties should at least be allowed to challenge the experts’ findings through oral or written questioning.
In a separate filing, the prosecutors opposed the need for another hearing, saying the experts had complied with the chamber’s instructions in assessing Duterte.
The prosecution added that if the chamber orders another assessment, the same panel should conduct it to ensure continuity in the evaluation.
The Trial Chamber III is yet to rule whether Duterte is fit to stand trial based on the experts’ assessments.
If the chamber finds him fit, his trial over crimes against humanity case will begin as scheduled on Nov. 30.
