Sen. Panfilo Lacson’s proposal to the Duterte administration to pay damages to the unintended victims of the war on illegal drugs should give another perspective as well as a timely gut check on law enforcers cracking down on drug suspects and drug lords.
President Rodrigo Duterte opened the door for possible assistance to unintended victims by suggesting in an ABS-CBN interview that compensation can be given, i.e., civil liability be paid to those caught in the crossfire, who tragically included children, between pursuing police and drug suspects.
One such victim, seven-year-old San Niño Batucan, was watching TV inside his home in Barangay Cansaga, Consolacion town in northern Cebu when he sustained a gunshot wound on his stomach from a stray bullet fired by a police officer during what Batucan’s father, Wilson, called a “failed antidrug operation.”
Despite the Consolacion police’s denial that there was an operation to arrest a suspected drug pusher that time, Wilson had good reason to suspect there was since there was no effort from the police to investigate the incident.
A law that would provide compensation to unintended victims like San Niño at the very least will help the police prepare for their operations better to avoid stray gunfire from wounding or killing bystanders or the loved ones who were trying to protect the drug suspect.
Chasing down and capturing — though the casualties incurred in police operations are rising — drug suspects isn’t an exact science, though that doesn’t prevent the police from preparing for them.
And it cannot be helped that there are moles getting in on the operations and informing the targets in advance which makes surprise raids more frequent in order to catch the suspects by surprise.
No matter how prepared the police are, there are bound to be consequences and untoward incidents, but the obvious goal is to reduce the incidence of these mistakes and capture the drug suspects.
Unless of course there is an unspoken mandate to execute all drug suspects as what rights advocates and countries like the US and the European Union have long suspected and loudly protested.
If the police are doing their best to ensure that there is zero collateral damage in their operations, President Duterte and PNP Chief Ronald “Bato” dela Rosa should not confine themselves to just paying off the families of these casualties in their drug war.
They should also prosecute these erring cops, despite the President’s assurance to protect and defend them from court prosecution, if only to make sure that the police force and other law enforcement agencies adhere to a sense of discipline and commitment to upholding due process.