AFTER finding that Chief Justice Renato Corona and spouse Cristina paid for various condominium units and lots with checks drawn from accounts in the Bank of the Philippine Islands and PSBank the prosecution panel is pressing the Senate impeachment court to subpoena the bank records of the couple.

The prosecutors will submit tomorrow a supplemental request asking the court to subpoena identified bank accounts of Corona.

The prosecutors believe that Corona opened a dollar account with PSBank on April 16,l 2007 with an initial deposit of $700,000 or around P30 million. The Chief Justice also purportedly won P1 million in PSBank’s Monthly Millions Raffle Promo on March 13, 2008. Both amounts were not declared in his SALNs. 

After hearing of the alleged dollar account was disclosed, PSBank immediately issued a statement saying that it was required by Republic Act No. 6426 to keep confidential all accounts of its foreign currency deposit unit. This indirectly implies that the Chief Justice holds an account with them, the prosecution panel said.

The prosecution alleged that Corona failed to declare the correct amounts of his cash and investments covered in his SALNs for the years 2002-2010. He declared, though, the following: 2002 – P2.7 million; 2003 – P3.3 million; 2004 – P3.3 million; 2005 – P3.3 million; 2006 – P2.5 million; 2007 – P2.5 million; 2008 – P2.5 million; 2009 – P2.5 million; 2010 – P3.5 million.

These figuress are in contrast to the documentary evidences such as official receipts provided by the executives of Megaworld, for instance, which showed amounts ranging from P4.5 million to P5 million withdrawn from his alleged BPI checking accounts from the years 2008-2009.

Corona properties such as in The Bellagio, Bonifacio Ridge and McKinley were reportedly paid for using the BPI accounts. The Bellagio penthouse alone, purchased in 2009, is worth P14.5 million as opposed to his declared P2.5 million cash and investment for that year.

There is a great disparity between the amounts indicated in Corona’s SALNs and the amounts in his checks, the prosecution pointed out.

Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile had cautioned the prosecution panel: “Yung bank records, bank accounts, dapat sabihin kung anong bank accounts yun. Hindi puwedeng i-subpoena ang mga records ng lahat ng bangko sa Pilipinas na hindi namin alam na mayroon bank account yung respondents. Delikado yun.”

The prosecutors now have the specific bank accounts they want to be subpoenaed for Tuesday’s hearing.