The ‘absurd’ status of a drug war case in the Supreme Court

MANILA, Philippines – In September 21, when the International Criminal Court (ICC) pre-trial chamber authorized the investigation into the Philippine drug war, it referred to what the prosecutor called an “emblematic” case of an alleged state policy to kill.

The case was of 28-year-old Efren Morillo, a fruit and vegetable vendor who played dead when policemen shot and killed four of his friends in a gruesome case of TokHang. As gunshots were heard, neighbors went near the home but could not do anything. One of the witnesses heard a police officer say, “Sir, may humihinga pa (Sir, one of them is still breathing).”

Morillo lived to tell the tale. But the charges he and the families of his four killed friends pressed against the police officers were dismissed by the Ombudsman in 2023. They elevated it to the Supreme Court. But just this November, when former president Rodrigo Duterte was already in jail at The Hague for being an alleged co-perpetrator, a division of the Supreme Court junked the families’ appeal.

The families filed a petition on Friday, December 5, to elevate it to the Supreme Court en banc or the full court of 15 justices.

“The dismissal of the instant petition by the Supreme Court will result in a potentially absurd situation wherein the indirect perpetrator or mastermind of the Philippine ‘war on drugs’ is being held in custody and facing charges before the International Criminal Court (ICC) for crimes against humanity of murder, while the direct perpetrators who actually murdered the loved ones of the petitioners — in the name of the ‘war on drugs’ — cannot even be prosecuted domestically,” said their petition.

The petition added: “The instant case has the kind of very strong evidence that 99% of the ‘war on drugs’ victims sorely lack. If the Supreme Court finds that the petitioners’ pieces of evidence are not enough to support the prosecution of the respondent police perpetrators, then virtually none of the thousands of killings during the ‘war on drugs’ can ever be prosecuted domestically.”

Lian Buan reports. – Rappler.com