Lawyer Nicholas Kaufman urged Palace Press Officer Undersecretary Claire Castro to “refrain from interfering” with his role as legal counsel for former President Rodrigo Duterte in his case before the International Criminal Court (ICC).
Kaufman issued this statement after Castro commented that he should “do better” than using a Senate Committee on Foreign Relations report on the arrest of his client as a reference point for their defense.
“I don’t think that the Senate panel report can have a negative impact on the case. It’s my job to decide what has a positive and negative impact on the case. I believe that the Senate report expresses the thoughts of the people. I believe that it helps our case,” he said.
On June 27, Kaufman asked the ICC Pre-Trial Chamber I to allow the defense team to reply to the Office of the Prosecutor’s response to their urgent request for former President Duterte’s interim release.
The defense argued that granting their petition would enable them to “present official Senate documentation to balance the factual gossip presented by the Prosecution, derived not from proper investigative work but, rather, from newspaper clippings.”
On July 8, Castro remarked “for the fees he (Kaufman) has allegedly been demanding from his client,” should “do better than that”—referring to the contents of the Senate report—and instead “concentrate on the allegations and admissions of the former President of his killings.”
The Senate inquiry was led by presidential sister Senator Imee Marcos, who allied herself with Vice President Sara Duterte.
