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Manila Bulletin devider Philippines devider National devider Robredo urges judiciary: Impose safeguards on search warrants

Robredo urges judiciary: Impose safeguards on search warrants

Published Mar 15, 2021 10:16 am

Vice President Leni Robredo urged the judiciary to impose safeguards when issuing search warrants to prevent instances of abuse, which earlier led to the deaths of nine activists in police operations that had the go signal of the local courts.

Vice-President Leni Robredo (OVP / Facebook / MANILA BULLETIN)

“Reminder ito sa mga members of the judiciary na nagbibigay ng search warrants. Siguraduhin nila na ang binigay nila hindi magagamit—hindi magagamit sa pagpatay. Hindi magagamit sa pang-aabuso ng kapangyahiran (This is a reminder to members of the judiciary who issue search warrants. They need to make sure that the search warrants will not be used to kill. It will not be used to abuse power),” she said during her radio show Sunday, March 14.

The vice president was reacting to the online public interview held by the Judicial and Bar Council in search of the next chief justice.

Supreme Court Chief Justice Diosdado Peralta asked chief justice aspirants if judges could “rely on the existence of a probable cause” and if there was a need for the Supreme Court to review policies surrounding the issuance of search warrants.

Robredo said the law has many “safeguards” and that it shouldn’t be that easy to issue search warrants because there should be a proper determination of the circumstances by the judges.

In fact, Robredo, a lawyer, added there was even a safeguard on the day and time of the issuance of the search warrant.

“Parang naging license to kill, eh. Sana hindi naman. Sana hindi naman—sana ipakita ng leadership na hindi nila ito-tolerate (It became a license to kill. Hopefully, it is not. Hopefully, the leadership will show that it will not tolerate this),” she said.

On March 7, in what has been known as “Bloody Sunday,” separate police operations led to the deaths of nine activists—six in Rizal, two in Batangas, and one in Cavite. Six others were arrested, including three in Laguna and Rizal.

The police claimed that the activists were members of the New People’s Army, the armed wing of the Communist Party of the Philippines, but their families said the activists were merely members of labor rights, housing rights, and human rights advocacy groups.

The police said these were all based on search warrants issued by courts in Metro Manila, which critics have tagged as “search warrant factories.”

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