Estrada resigned from office in 2001 during a popular uprising in Metro Manila after an aborted impeachment trial in which he was charged with plunder and perjury.

A few months after the January 2001 popular uprising that ousted Estrada, the Philippine Ombudsman filed two charges at the Sandiganbayan on April 4, 2001; one for plunder and the other for perjury.

Also charged were Charlie Ang, Yolanda Ricaforte, Alma Alfaro, Eleuterio Tan, Delia Rajas, and Jaime Dichaves, who was later added.

One complaint was docketed as OMB-0-00-1756 (Romeo T. Capulong, Leonard de Vera and Dennis B. Funa v. Joseph Ejercito Estrada et al.; see Victor Tan Uy v. Office of the Ombudsman et al., G.R.

On January 22, 2001, two days after his implied resignation from office, President Estrada was ordered by the ombudsman to file his counter-affidavit in answer to the complaints.

Their case against Joseph Estrada was based on the following: Former President Joseph Estrada's defense panel, led by Estelito Mendoza and composed of former Supreme Court justices and other celebrated Philippine lawyers, based their defense on the following points: President Estrada recalls the Arroyos plotting with the civil society and the military in January 2000, to take over a year later; The House of Representatives impeaching him without debate and voting; The Senate blue-ribbon committee not hearing him out; The Impeachment Court not citing for contempt the losers in a democratic debate and voting; and the Supreme Court conniving with the elite to swear in then-Vice President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo at 12:20 p.m. of January 20, 2001, -(Manila Times, September 30, 2007) 1.

(Manila Times, September 30, 2007) Lead counsel Estelito Mendoza insisted there is no evidence Estrada received bribe money from jueteng lords.

Fabrication of evidence: Manrique, a former action officer of the Volunteers Against Crime and Corruption (VACC), narrated in his affidavit how he, sometime in the last week of October 2001, was contacted by a lawyer(State Prosecutor Dennis Villa-Ignacio) who represented himself as a member of the prosecution team in the Estrada cases.

On September 12, 2007, Joseph Estrada was acquitted of perjury but found guilty of plunder and sentenced to reclusión perpetua with the accessory penalties of perpetual disqualification from public office and forfeiture of ill-gotten wealth.

On September 12, 2007, Sandiganbayan's Presiding Justice Teresita de Castro and two other magistrates unanimously acquitted his son, Senator Jinggoy Estrada, and a lawyer Edward Serapio of plunder charges.

[17] On September 26, 2007, Joseph Estrada appealed by filing a 63-page motion for reconsideration of the Sandiganbayan judgment penned by Teresita de Castro (submitting 5 legal grounds).

[21] On October 22, 2007, Acting Justice Secretary Agnes Devanadera stated that Joseph Estrada is seeking a "full, free, and unconditional pardon" from President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo.

[22][23] On October 25, 2007, President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo granted executive clemency to Joseph Estrada based on the recommendation by the Department of Justice.

Bunye noted that Estrada committed in his application not to seek public office, and he would be free from his Tanay resthouse on October 26, noon.

[27] On September 14, 2007, chief presidential legal counsel Sergio Antonio Apostol officially stated that Sandiganbayan Justices Teresita de Castro, Diosdado Peralta and Francisco Villaruz Jr. should decline Judicial and Bar Council nomination and await other vacancies to ease pressure on President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo: "Para hindi na maipit ang Presidente (In order to spare the President from pressure), they should withdraw their nomination.

Senate of the Philippines Majority Leader Francis Pangilinan, ex-officio member, Judicial and Bar Council stated that the three Sandiganbayan justices "should have the delicadeza [gentleness] not to accept a promotion to the highest tribunal to dispel any suspicion that they pronounced Mr. Estrada guilty expecting a reward from Palace ... We do not want to see a cloud of suspicion over the appointees to the Supreme Court.

"[31] On December 4, Sandiganbayan Special Division chairperson Teresita de Castro was appointed as the new associate justice of the Supreme Court of the Philippines.

President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo canceled a scheduled attendance at a gathering of business leaders in Makati that afternoon due to security reasons.

[34] President Arroyo was scheduled to drop by the Philippine Mid-Year Economic Briefing which was to be held 1:30 p.m. at the Rizal Ballroom of the Makati Shangri-La Hotel.