On the fourth and final day of the confirmation of charges hearing before the International Criminal Court (ICC), lead defense counsel Nicholas Kaufman challenged prosecution claims tying former President Rodrigo Duterte to multiple killings during the country’s controversial drug war—including the high-profile deaths of then-Albuera, Leyte Mayor Rolando Espinosa, Reynaldo “Jerry” Parojinog, and others—insisting that the prosecution had failed to show any direct link between Duterte and such incidents.

“There is no evidence linking former President Duterte to the killings of Espinosa, Parojinog, and Benjamin Visda,” Kaufman told the ICC judges on Friday, February 27, asserting that Duterte’s involvement effectively ended once Espinosa surrendered to authorities in 2016 and that “what happened thereafter, as awful as it may be, had nothing to do with our client. And not one witness can say that.”

Kaufman also disputed prosecution arguments about a systematic campaign of unlawful killings, contending that official police reports and judicial processes (such as search warrants in the Parojinog case) undermine claims of premeditated extrajudicial executions. He described classifications like “high-value targets” as operational tools used in legitimate anti-drug operations, “not a code for an instruction to kill.”

Kaufman reiterated broader defense positions reflected throughout the hearing: that there is no direct evidence Duterte issued specific orders to kill, and that witnesses have not testified to receiving such commands. The defense has argued that prosecutions rely on circumstantial links rather than clear causal connections between Duterte’s rhetoric and specific violent acts.