A LandBank manager testifying on the confidential funds on Wednesday flagged the withdrawal of P125 million each on four separate occasions by Vice President Sara Duterte’s office as “unusual,” though she said it was not considered a suspicious transaction.

Violeta Constantino, the first witness for the prosecution for Article 1, was the department manager of LandBank Shaw Boulevard Branch from May 2017 until she retired in January 2024. 

She was responsible for processing the encashment of four checks for OVP Special Disbursing Officer Gina Acosta amounting to P125 million each, or a total of P500 million. 

“This is unusual…In our personal opinion at the bank, of course, we wondered where they would use this cash. But of course, we didn’t ask,” Constantino said when asked by Senator-judge Erwin Tulfo on whether such an amount of withdrawal for a government agency is normal in bank operations. 

She also admitted that in her 32 years in LandBank, it was her “first time” to encounter such a magnitude of cash withdrawal requested by a government agency.

Wednesday’s trial marked the first day of the presentation of evidence for Article 1, which accounts for the longest trial dates, with 31 days requested by the prosecution. 

Article 1 focuses on alleged misuse of P612.5 million in confidential funds in the OVP (P500 million) and the Department of Education (P112.5 million). Duterte headed the DepEd from July 2022 to July 2024.  

According to Constantino, the transaction was deemed unusual because the average maximum amount of withdrawal is only pegged at P500,000. Another thing is that the transaction was cash-based rather than the standard check-based disbursement that is typically used by government and private entities.

Banks are mandated to report to the AMLC any transactions exceeding more than P500,00 per day, regardless of whether the depositor is a member of a government agency or a private entity. 

The witness acknowledged that the transactions are covered by the AMLC regulations, but invoked confidentiality on whether suspicious transaction reports were filed, citing bank secrecy laws. 

Acosta was accompanied by then-OVP Director of Administrative and Financial Services Lemuel Ortonio in encashing the checks on 20 December 2022, 6 February 2023, 25 April 2023, and 14 July 2023. 

Original copies of the checks were already shredded in accordance with the bank’s one-year policy retention, according to Constantino. 

The money was released from the bank’s backroom in 25 packs amounting to P1 million each and was stored in four “large, long” gym bags. 

Despite the sheer size of the amount involved, Constantino remarked that the transaction was not deemed suspicious or doubtful as it complied with the two-day notice, which is mandatory for large transactions.

"But for this particular [transaction], we didn’t have any doubts because we knew the transaction was legitimate,” she said in response to Senator-judge Bam Aquino’s query about whether she found the withdrawal suspicious.

Constantino narrated that no bank personnel or security escorted Acosta and Ortonio out of the bank, as it goes against bank policy. 

The OVP’s bank account was transferred to LandBank Shaw in September 2022 as its office moved from Quezon City to Mandaluyong after Duterte succeeded then-VP Leni Robredo in June that year.

Duterte allegedly spent the P125 million released in December 2022 in just 11 days. Of the sum, P73.3 million was disallowed by the Commission on Audit due to a lack of supporting evidence proving that the funds were used on information gathering or surveillance activities for which the funds were intended.

In a House hearing in 2024, Acosta confirmed that she released P125 million in confidential funds to Vice Presidential Security and Protection Group Commander Col. Raymund Lachica, the security officer of OVP, on 20 December 2022.

Among the alleged recipients of the secret funds was the infamous “Mary Grace Piattos,” who had no civil registry records, such as birth, marriage, and death certificates, as previously reported by the Philippine Statistics Authority.

Aside from Piattos, lawmakers also flagged the alleged spurious names of other recipients, namely, “Jay Kamote,” “Miggy Mango,” “Dodong Gang,” “Xiaome Ocho,” “Mico Harina,” “Ralph Josh Bacon,” and “Sala Casim,” among others.