PNP Internal Affairs has not filed criminal cases vs. any cops over drug war deaths —Dulay

The Philippine National Police’s (PNP) Internal Affairs Service (IAS), the police force's internal mechanism to investigate its members, has not filed any criminal charges against police officers involved in the thousands of drug war deaths amid police operations during the Duterte administration, PNP-IAS Inspector General Brigido Dulay said Wednesday.

Dulay made the response upon the questioning of Bukidnon lawmaker Keith Flores as to why not a single criminal charge was filed against police officials involved in the killing of over 6,000 drug suspects during police operations.

“The IAS has motu proprio powers to investigate, especially involving discharge of a firearm resulting in deaths. Under Republic Act 8551, the IAS has, one, the power to investigate and another, file necessary criminal charges if evidence warrants. I have asked my people to look for criminal cases [filed] so far, and to my knowledge, this power has not been exercised,” Dulay, who only assumed his post two months ago, said.

“I am studying the reasons why this power has not been exercised. Our assessment is not yet done, but we can [later] go back to this committee and provide a background as to why it has never happened,” he added.

Dulay also said during the same probe that the IAS has limited its investigation to the administrative liabilities of police officers implicated in drug war deaths.

This did not sit well with Flores, who responded with, “Why would you limit yourselves to administrative aspects when it is within your power to file criminal charges?”

Dulay said that his office will look at why such was the policy then and vowed to address it.

“I am not privy [to what happened then] because I took office barely two months ago, but we will look into it...into the breadth and length of whatever the administrative investigation,” he said.

Flores vowed to wait for Dulay’s promised feedback.

“I would wait for that because it is highly improbable that there are thousands of deaths as a result of the police’ anti-drug operations at walang kahit isang criminal case na na-file [and not one criminal case has been filed],” Flores said.

Joshua Laxamana case

Lawyer Kristina Conti, who serves as counsel for families of drug war victims, claimed that IAS has also the propensity of dismissing administrative charges against police officers in drug war deaths, spelling doom for the victims since it effectively prevents the families from pursuing criminal charges.

Conti cited the case of 17-year-old Joshua Laxamana, who was killed by the police for supposedly being a drug suspect. Laxamana was not listed on the police drugs list, and was killed while riding a motorcycle. Laxamana’s family believes it is a case of mistaken identity.

Ultimately, the IAS cleared the police officers of administrative charges.

Conti said they sought criminal charges against the police before the Office of the Ombudsman, but the Ombudsman dismissed the case because of the IAS decision clearing police officers of administrative liability. Conti and Laxamana’s family brought the case to the Supreme Court, which upheld the Ombudsman's decision.

“Because the IAS dismissed it, the Ombudsman said it will be hard-pressed to review because IAS already did the investigation. The Supreme Court decision [upholding the Ombudsman’s decision] was not on the merits of the case because there is no reception of evidence to begin with since IAS did not even ask the victims to come in during their investigation. The IAS investigation is one-sided,” Conti said.

“Also, an administrative case has a lower standard of evidence. If the police were able to hurdle the administrative charge, how much more for a criminal charge which warrants a higher standard of evidence? The dismissal of the IAS [of administrative charges] really triggers the exclusion of options for the victims,” she added. — BM, GMA Integrated News