FACT CHECK: Sara Duterte’s claim on lawmaker’s ‘conviction’ of child abuse needs context

During the House appropriations committee hearing on the Office of the Vice President’s (OVP) proposed P2.03 billion budget for 2025, Vice President Sara Duterte said she “[did] not understand why a person convicted of child abuse [was] still sitting in the seat of the House.” This needs context.

STATEMENT

In the Aug. 27 hearing, ACT Teachers Party-list Rep. France Castro called out Duterte for her refusal to give direct answers to questions on the notice of disallowance issued by the Commission on Audit over the OVP’s confidential funds in 2022.

Duterte, a lawyer who was also Education secretary until she resigned last June 19, retorted that Castro and Marikina City Rep. Stella Quimbo, senior vice chair of the appropriations committee, were being “one-sided.” Watch this video:

Source: House of Representatives, COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS – BUDGET BRIEFING/HEARINGS OF THE FY 2025 PROPOSED BUDGET (OVP), Aug. 27, 2024, watch from 2:01:17 to 2:01:36 and from 2:07:35 to 2:08:08

FACT

While the vice president did not name names, she was looking at Castro when she mentioned “somebody convicted of child abuse” in her response. Castro has indeed been convicted of child abuse, but the case is still pending appeal and she has not been unseated.

In a July 3 decision, the Tagum Regional Trial Court (RTC) Branch 2 found Castro and 12 others guilty for violating Section 10(a) of Republic Act No. 7610, which includes “any other acts of child abuse, neglect or exploitation.” However, Castro, along with the 12 other respondents, filed a notice of appeal to the same court on July 22 to elevate their case to the Court of Appeals.

“As we know, the decision is not yet final. We have still the Court of Appeals, we have still the Supreme Court. Not until the case is final, then there is no final conviction,” Castro said in a mix of English and Filipino during a July 16 interview on ABS-CBN’s Hot Copy.

A perfected appeal – one that is filed and paid for on-time – suspends the judgment or final order unless the Court of Appeals, the law, or the rules of civil procedure provide otherwise, based on Section 8(b) of Rule 42 of the 2019 Amendments to the 1997 Rules of Civil Procedure.

BACKSTORY

In its July 3 decision, the Tagum RTC Branch 2 in Davao Del Norte sentenced Castro and the 12 other respondents to four to six years imprisonment and ordered them to pay P20,000 to each of the 14 victims.

(Guided by the code of principles of the International Fact-Checking Network at Poynter, VERA Files tracks the false claims, flip-flops, misleading statements of public officials and figures, and debunks them with factual evidence. Find out more about this initiative and our methodology.)