COPS AND GUNFIRES

BY Glaiza Rae D. Amable, BS MLS ’22

Recent atrocities committed by Philippine National Police officers across the country have made Filipinos ask what happened to the well-publicized police reforms that were intended to put the PNP’s slogan, “To Serve and Protect,” into action.

The public discourse on police brutality has met various points of view. Some believe the killings were the result of an isolated incident involving a “bad cop” who should be prosecuted and removed from the force. Others blame lawlessness and a lack of respect for law enforcement for the “us versus them” mentality, while some emphasize a policing culture that uses brutality and misuse of power to combat crime, relying on frequent pronouncements of President Rodrigo Duterte ordering lawmen to shoot quickly in a speech on December 3: “I’m telling the uniformed personnel, do your duty. Do it in accordance with law but be alert and be wise. Alam mo, kaunting pagkakamali lang, barilin mo na.”

All these viewpoints may have some truth. A series of alleged transgressions started after the 2020 December killings of two unarmed civilians, Sonya and Frank Gregorio, which rightly met with widespread condemnation and debate about the need for police reform.

Such cases of police brutality Simply reflect a culture of impunity which has pervaded the police force to the point where it has been ignored or protected by a government that coddles killer officers.

In fact, administration officials, allies, and fans were at pains to explain away Senior Master Sergeant Jonel Nuezca’s behavior and separate the PNP from any institutional blame. The cop’s possible “insanity” to his being under the influence of drugs were among the excuses. The Gregorio mother and son, on the other hand, were accused of “asking for it” by displaying a lack of respect for Nuezca, responding to and ridiculing his daughter, and refusing to accompany the officer to the police station. However, given the high frequency of suspects killed in police custody, one can understand the Gregorios’ suspicion and fear of being taken away. Without the video, would Nuezca have given up and surrendered?

This brutality on the victims was by no means an isolated incident, as police officials and the administration asserted. However, it was the former police chief General Debold

Sinas who seemed to dismiss the importance of the video, even warning individuals against videotaping, saying that it was extremely tricky and could put their lives in jeopardy.

A similar incident hounded its predecessor when drunk Police Master Sergeant Hensie Zinampanan shot and killed 52-year-old Lilybeth Valdez in a case caught on video on May 31. According to the victim’s daughter, Valdez was at the store when the police officer who was allegedly intoxicated approached her, pulled her hair and shot the victim in the neck. The incident occurred a month after Valdez’s son was involved in a fistfight with an officer on May 1, and since then, Zinampan has been threatening their family. However, a similar question was posed. Would Zinampanan have surrendered if not for the viral video?

With police impunity showing no signs of abating, it is just proper to take in what Foreign Secretary Teddyboy Locsin said on Twitter: “It is the duty of every citizen to take photos and videos—a dimension of crime-fighting we can finally trust because it is we, the people, fighting crime by exposing it. Recording crime especially by crime fighters is the best reason to have a cellphone.”

Moreover, both situations demonstrate that police accountability may be limited to crimes caught on camera. It would not also be an exaggeration that without the

videos, both the Tarlac and Quezon shooting would have followed the official “nanlaban” narrative that police routinely foist on the public, indicating the need for body cameras. These cannot put an end to such cruelty, but they can provide a measure of transparency to operations in which the PNP regularly claims, without proof, that victims fought back.

With whatever transpired, one thing is certain – it will not take just a plain dismissal, but a thorough prosecution to those killer cops to convince the public that they are serious about following the law even against their own kind.