FORMER senator Leila de Lima is finally clear of all drug charges leveled against her by the Duterte administration. This ends seven years of an arduous legal battle that she saw through from inside prison walls.
Kudos to her and her team who did not hide in the shadows and faced head-on the vaunted prosecutorial machinery of government.
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In another drug-related case, Caloocan judge Ma. Rowena Violago Alejandria has found four members of the city police guilty of homicide for the killing of a man and his son at the height of the Duterte drug war in September 2016.
Luis Bonifacio and his 19-year-old son Gabriel were killed in an alleged buy-bust operation on September 15, 2016.
It was past midnight when a group of armed policemen barged into their house, declared a search, and required Luis to kneel, with Gabriel defying the order to leave the house while wrapping his protective arms around his father.
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Judge Alejandria sentenced each of the police officers to prison terms of six to 10 years, plus P400,000 in damages to the bereaved family.
Why homicide and not murder which carries a heavier penalty?
The reason is that the judge is limited to the four corners of the Information, or the formal charge, filed by the Deputy Ombudsman for the Military and Other Law Enforcement Officers (MOLEO).
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MOLEO downgraded the complaint to homicide because of the purported absence of circumstances that would qualify the offense to murder.
It cited the lack of evidence that would establish evident premeditation since it was not shown that the buy-bust operation was planned with the purpose of killing the victims.
There was no treachery because it could not be shown that the attack was made swiftly and deliberately without affording the unsuspecting victims the chance to resist or evade the attack.
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Interestingly, the Supreme Court agreed with the Ombudsman and allowed only the case of homicide to progress against the accused policemen. It did not see gross error in the Ombudsman’s refusal to file an upgraded charge for murder.
The complainant could only present evidence that would prove homicide. Evidence of murder would be irrelevant.
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The Caloocan judge thought quite differently. She did not believe the policemen’s claim that they were met with gunfire when they entered the house of the victims, and were therefore compelled to engage them in a gunfight.
The judge found that “there was nothing to defend when they suddenly entered the house of the victims.” The number and location of the wounds sustained by the victims would negate the claim that the policemen were acting in legitimate self-defense when they fired the fatal shots.
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The Department of Justice was quick to laud the conviction as a triumph of the rule of law.
This was rebuffed by the National Union of People’s Lawyers who said that the assigned city prosecutor never actively participated in prosecuting the case. In fact, Pros. Darwin Canete testified for the defense, and issued a report that the family was unwilling to prosecute the case.
If at all, this is testament to the courage of widows and orphans, and the tenacity of human rights lawyers who assisted them in the filing of actions all the way up to the Supreme Court./PN
