Four Philippine police officers were on Tuesday convicted for the killings of a father and son, marking a rare prosecution of law enforcement officials involved in former President Rodrigo Duterte’s notorious drug war.
These officers were each sentenced to up to 10 years in prison for the 2016 shooting deaths during an anti-drug operation in a Manila slum.
Manila Regional Trial Court Judge, Rowena Alejandria, stated in her written verdict that the officers did not deny their involvement in the operation where Luis and Gabriel Domingo were killed.
Alejandria wrote, “It must be worthy to note that the accused themselves did not deny their presence and participation in the police operation conducted, the same event where the victims Luis and Gabriel (Domingo) were killed.”
Duterte’s anti-drug campaign, which spanned from 2016 to 2022, led to thousands of deaths by police and unknown assailants, and is now under investigation by the International Criminal Court.
Critics have labeled the crackdown as state-sponsored extrajudicial killings.
Mary Ann Domingo, the partner of victim Luis Bonifacio, cried on her son’s shoulder as they listened to the verdict in the crowded Manila courtroom.
Policemen Virgilio Cervantes, Arnel de Guzman, Johnston Alacre, and Artemio Saguros were ordered to pay 300,000 pesos ($5,120) each in damages to the victims’ heirs.
The family alleged that over a dozen officers were involved in the nighttime raid, maintaining that the victims were unarmed and not involved in drugs when the police opened fire.
The defendants claimed self-defense, asserting that the suspects were armed and shot at them first. State prosecutors pursued the lesser charge of homicide instead of murder, which carries a heavier penalty and involves deliberate intent to kill.
Official records indicated over 6,000 deaths occurred in police anti-narcotics operations, though rights groups estimate the number to be in the tens of thousands, primarily targeting poor individuals often without proof of drug involvement.
Duterte had openly endorsed the use of lethal force by police if they felt their lives were in danger.
This crackdown has faced international condemnation and is the subject of an ICC investigation.
Despite this, only five other policemen have been convicted for killing drug suspects: three Manila officers in 2018 for the 2017 murder of a 17-year-old, and two narcotics officers in 2023 for separate killings in 2016 and 2017, the latter involving a South Korean businessman.
Many families are too frightened or lack the resources to pursue legal action in the Philippines’ slow judicial system.
The ICC’s investigation, initiated in 2021, suggests that a “widespread and systematic attack against the civilian population” occurred as part of state policy. Duterte withdrew the Philippines from the ICC in 2019, limiting the investigation to incidents prior to that date. His successor, President Ferdinand Marcos, has refused to cooperate with the ICC, asserting that the Philippines has a functioning judicial system.
