Veronica “Kitty” Duterte filed a second motion before the Supreme Court this week urging the tribunal to act on long-pending habeas corpus petitions seeking the return of former president Rodrigo Duterte from The Hague — as a new and formidable defense lawyer prepares to take over his case at the International Criminal Court.
The motion, filed through her lawyer Paolo Panelo, comes more than 14 months after the original petitions were lodged on March 12, 2025, with no substantive action from the high court. Panelo argued that events at the Senate on Monday have made urgent judicial intervention unavoidable.
“The executive shamelessly capitalized on the Supreme Court’s silence on the petitions as a license to perpetrate the same grave constitutional violations complained of in the petitions,” Panelo said.
He was referring to the National Bureau of Investigation’s attempted enforcement on Monday of an ICC arrest warrant against Sen. Ronald dela Rosa, whom prosecutors have named as a co-perpetrator in the former president’s crimes against humanity case.
Panelo cited Senate Resolution 44, adopted on March 17, which was aimed at shielding all Filipinos from what he described as extrajudicial rendition — “the very fate suffered by” the former president. Government respondents, represented by former executive secretary Lucas Bersamin, should move immediately to facilitate Duterte’s return, Panelo said.
“Dramatic events at the Senate on Monday prove that immediate and decisive action on the petitions is not only warranted, but absolutely imperative,” he added.
Kitty’s filing comes as a significant legal transition unfolds at the ICC. British barrister Peter Haynes — a King’s Counsel who secured one of the court’s rarest outcomes, a full acquittal on appeal — has been confirmed as her father’s new lead defense counsel, replacing Nicholas Kaufman.
Kaufman’s withdrawal filing, which became public on May 12 after Trial Chamber III ordered its release in unredacted form, revealed that it was Avanceña and Kitty who chose the incoming replacement lawyer.
Kaufman’s withdrawal request, dated May 8, noted that the defense team visited Duterte at the ICC detention center in The Hague on May 7, where Duterte formally released Kaufman and named Haynes as his preferred successor. Kaufman’s one-year contract had ended on March 31, 2026.
Haynes confirmed he is “ready, willing and able to assume immediate representation” and is expected to attend the status conference scheduled for May 27, at which Trial Chamber III will determine the commencement date for the trial proper.
Haynes served as president of the ICC Bar Association from 2019 to 2021, becoming the first person re-elected to the post. He is affiliated with St Philips Chambers in Birmingham, England, where his profile describes him as one of the foremost practitioners in international criminal and humanitarian law.
His most prominent ICC work was the defense of Jean-Pierre Bemba, the former vice president of the Democratic Republic of Congo, whose conviction for war crimes and crimes against humanity was unanimously overturned on appeal in 2018 — a 3-2 decision by the Appeals Chamber that found the trial court had misjudged Bemba’s command responsibility over troops deployed abroad.
In 2024, Haynes was assigned by the ICC to represent Joseph Kony in the court’s first in absentia proceedings.
In his withdrawal filing, Kaufman described Haynes as someone who brings a “wealth of experience” to the case and expressed confidence that Duterte’s representation would remain in capable hands. Associate counsel Dov Jacobs also separately withdrew from the defense team, with the French lawyer citing a planned restructuring ahead of trial.
