After Antonio Trillanes IV made explosive allegations last weekend in connection with the impeachment case of Vice President Sara Duterte, a YouTube channel is claiming that Presiding Officer Francis “Chiz” Escudero cited the former senator for contempt. This is false.
On Oct. 4, the video carried a title with characters replaced by numbers to intentionally misspell some words—a common tactic in dodging detection by platforms, fact-checkers, and content moderators. The title read:
“KAPAPASOK LANG! H1NATULAN NA! TRILILING CONTEMPT NA! NASAMPOLAN NI CHIZ! BILIS NG KAR-MA! D1SERVED!
(JUST IN! Already sentenced! Trililing in contempt! Chiz punished him to set an example. Karma works fast! Deserved)!”
The nearly 48-minute video also bore the same claim in its thumbnail and added that Trillanes has been “suspended” from unknown positions or duties, considering that he is a private citizen and does not hold any current official public posts.
At least two users posted the link to the YouTube video on Facebook.
No credible news reports, official announcements from the spokesperson of the Senate impeachment court, or statements from Escudero himself indicate that the presiding officer cited Trillanes for contempt.
The video merely showed a political commentary criticizing the press conference held by Trillanes on Oct. 2. Nowhere in the video did it provide any concrete evidence of a court order or any other official notices to support its claim.
During the Oct. 5 and 6 impeachment trial, Escudero never cited Trillanes for contempt.
Without naming names, Escudero stated on Day 33 of the trial that the impeachment court would not be distracted by outside criticism or “tantrums.” This followed Trillanes’ press briefing, where he questioned the presiding officer’s refusal to issue a subpoena for him to testify on Article II, which covers the charges of unexplained wealth in the ouster proceedings against the vice president.
Asked if Escudero prevented Trillanes from testifying, Senate President Sherwin Gatchalian, in an Oct. 4 interview on radio dzBB, denied such allegation, adding that senator-judges were consulted “and there were a lot of opinions so it was not solely [Escudero’s] decision.”
The video with untrue claim began circulating two days after Trillanes publicly presented information he would have testified about in Duterte’s impeachment trial before he had requested to be dropped as a witness to relieve the prosecution of alleged “pressures.”
Among his allegations was that more than P319 million flowed from Chinese government-linked entities and corporations into Cale88 Foods Corp., a company linked to Duterte’s husband, lawyer Manases “Mans” Carpio.
[Related report: Trillanes bares P319-M China funds to Sara’s husband, drug-linked payouts to Dutertes]
The spurious video, posted by YouTube channel NEWS UPDATE FILES (created on Jan. 31, 2022), has so far received 987 reactions, 90 comments and 16,202 views.
