Vice President Sara Duterte's legal team has irked lawyer-legislator Cagayan de Oro City 2nd district Rep. Rufus Rodriguez for the second hearing in a row amid the former's ongoing impeachment proceedings before the House Committee on Justice.

This time, it was an "insulting" letter with an "erroneous" assertion that got the Mindanao congressman's goat.

It was through this letter, addressed to justice panel chairperson, Batangas 2nd district Rep. Gerville "Jinky Bitrics" Luistro, that the Duterte camp explained why it won't participate in the House hearings.

"I am really totally dismayed by this letter sent by the lawyers. We have here six lawyers who has given, submitted a letter to the Honorable Chairperson, Gerville Luistro, that we have no jurisdiction to conduct this hearing," Rodriguez said.

The legal luminary recalled that he was also recently "disappointed" by the Duterte camp's Consolidated Verified Answer Ad Cautelam to the impeachment case, which delved into technicalities instead of answering the allegations head-on.

The verified answer, signed by 16 lawyers, was sent to the justice panel last March 16.

As for the Duterte lawyers' letter, Rodriguez said that the "ground" they cited for saying that the committee had no authority or jurisdiction to conduct the proceedings was their belief that the House members cannot hold a trial on the respondent.

In the impeachment process, only the senators can hold an impeachment trial.

But Rodriguez, the House resident legal expert, said that the justice panel wasn't holding a "trial".

"Can you imagine that? How can they be able to support this allegation that we have the committee, has no power or jurisdiction to conduct any form of trial?...because precisely we are not having a trial here on the merits, but only, madam chair, on a hearing to determine probable cause," he said.

"Any law student would know that precisely our committee has the power to hear on finding probable cause by the two complaints where we found sufficiency in form, substance, and grounds," he noted, referring to the two remaining impeachment raps against his fellow Mindanaonon.

Pointing to the letter, Rodriguez, said "[It is] erroneous because they are the ones contravening the Constitution. The lawyers of the Vice President are the ones contravening our rules of impeachment."

The chairman of the House Committee on Constitutional Amendments went on to propose a motion of action against Duterte's legal team, as he said that the justice panel "should be able to tell the lawyers that this is really a scrap of paper that they have submitted to this honorable committee".

"It's an insult to the committee if this is what they want. And so, therefore, we have an order from the committee for them to tell them that they are wrong and that they are invited in the next hearing so that we continue to try to give due process to the Vice President, which we wanted precisely to have her side on these grounds. Thank you," he further said.

Luistro ultimately suggested that the justice committee produce a written response to the Duterte lawyers in lieu of any motion with the operating word "order". This was in the interest of keeping intact the distinction between a trial and a hearing or preliminary discussion on probable cause in the impeachment proceedings.

The justice panel members favored the chairperson's suggestion.

The committee has been a stickler for rules in the impeachment process, given that the impeachment case pursued by the House last year ended up being declared unconstitutional by the Supreme Court.