Opposition Senator Leila de Lima has welcomed the filing of murder charges against the 17 police officers over the killing of two of nine activists who were killed during the so-called “Bloody Sunday” operations in CALABARZON last March 2021.
The detained senator, who is seeking a re-election in the upcoming May 2022 elections, said the move is a welcome step in ensuring justice and accountability.
“I laud the step taken by the NBI (National Bureau of Investigation) in filing murder complaints against 17 cops over the killing of two of the nine activists killed during the ‘Bloody Sunday’ operations in March 2021,” De Lima said in her latest dispatch.
“These development in the Bloody Sunday raid cases is a big step forward for the human rights community. Lalo na kung iisipin natin ang mga buhay at kalayaan na isinakripisyo (especially if you think of the lives and freedom that were sacrificed),” she pointed out.
“Kaya hindi puwedeng masanay tayo sa namamayaning sistema ng kawalang-katarungan, kahit paulit-ulit na ang patayan at pag-atake sa mamamayan (It’s not right for us to get used to a system of injustice and violence and attacks against the community),” she added.
Reportedly, the NBI has filed the case before the Department of Justice (DOJ) for the killing of activists and partners Ariel Evangelista and Ana Mariz “Chai” Lemita-Evangelista in Nasugbu, Batangas. Based on the complaint, the NBI found that the cops who implemented a search warrant on the Evangelista couple had a “deliberate intent to kill.”
“Truly, this is the only proper turn that this case could take, especially given the evidence of irregularities in an operation that was supposedly merely for the implementation of a search warrant,” De Lima said.
According to the NBI, the police officers and personnel involved in the case were from the Philippine National Police Criminal Investigation and Detection Group (PNP-CIDG) in CALABARZON. However, the names of the 17 police officers would only be made public once the Office of the Prosecutor issues a subpoena, according to the DOJ.
The Evangelista couple were among the nine activists killed last March 7, 2021, during the joint and simultaneous operations by the PNP and Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) in Batangas, Cavite, Laguna, and Rizal provinces.
De Lima said she is not surprised over the findings of the NBI on the PNP-AFP joint operations.
“It however, remains sickening and horrifying especially because we know that this may be the fate of the other activists, drug suspects, and ordinary people in the many still unresolved cases of extrajudicial killings in our country. This could also happen to anyone of us,” she said.