HRW report: How Davao City's squad killers get away with murder

MANILA, Philippines - Adon Mandagit’s mother wasn’t completely clueless about her son’s impending death. Months before Adon was slain, the police had warned her that something bad would happen to her child. And so death came on broad daylight, sometime in July 2007 on Bolton Street in Davao City. Two men on motorcycle shot the 15-year-old Adon, once in his neck, twice in his head. Everybody on the street saw the killing, but nobody dared to stop the culprits who as they got away even managed to waive their guns before the crowd. Adon is among the city’s disposable people victimized by the dreaded vigilante group Davao Death Squad [DDS]. For over a decade now, the DDS has been cleansing the city streets of supposed undesirables – suspected drug dealers, petty criminals, and street children. “Most of them were young, poor, and powerless," says Kenneth Roth, executive director of the New York-based Human Rights Watch [HRW] that recently released a 103-page report on the death squad killings in Mindanao after a nine-month field investigation. A total of 814 vigilante killings have been recorded from Aug. 19, 1998 to Feb. 1, 2009, wherein 33 percent happened in the last two years, according to HRW, quoting data from the Coalition Against Summary Execution [CASE]. This means that in the last 11 years, about 74 people in the city had been victimized yearly by alleged summary executions. A third of them were young adults, 18 to 25 years old, and at least nine percent were children, according to CASE. Messengers of death The spate of killings happens under the very nose of authorities. However, perpetrators remain unpunished. Roth says impunity isn’t that surprising because “the supposed law enforcers are the ones promoting lawlessness in the city." In its report, the HRW found out from at least nine insiders that the city’s village officials and policemen were involved in the recruitment and training of death squad members. HRW also claims that these officials often act as messengers of death, preparing the “list" of those scheduled to be “liquidated." “Accounts of insiders to DDS operations suggest that the police and barangay officials collect the names of drug users, people with criminal record, and the like….Usually, the police or barangay officials deliver the warning…In some cases, people were advised to leave the neighborhood, and a number of people fled after the warning. Others ignored the warning…with dire consequences," the report says. Effortless escape As if with blessings from the powers that be, killers don’t attempt to hide from the public when they hit their targets. HRW says the killers only hide their guns, but not their identity. It says that the presence of multiple eyewitnesses does not seem to restrain the perpetrators who are often seen on motorcycles, wearing jackets or buttoned-down shirts, apparently to conceal their weapons. “Witnesses can often clearly see the perpetrators. While perpetrators often wear baseball caps…they do not try to hide their faces. In some cases, they threaten bystanders before fleeing from the crime scene, waving their guns and telling them to keep quiet," says HRW. Escape also appears to be effortless for the killers. Just like in Philippine movies, police reportedly often arrive late at the scene of the crime. Roth says that even when authorities are notified in advance about the crime, they “make themselves scarce to allow the culprits to get away." “They don’t follow up with any kind of serious investigation," adds Roth. Switching to knives HRW doubts that the crime is being perpetrated by common gang members. Because if it is, the killers would not be using .45-caliber, .38-caliber or 9-millimeter handguns. “The vast majority of gang members cannot afford such expensive weapons, and mostly use knives or homemade pistols instead," HRW says. But lately, the DDS has reportedly begun switching to using knives, according to HRW. “They [insiders] say that the DDS now often favors knives because they are cheaper, attract less attention, and stab wounds make it easier for the police to claim that the victim was killed by gang members." Roth has no doubt that the DDS “is intimately connected with the government." “There’s no question about that. The only open question is how high up in the government hierarchy are orders being given, as opposed to the existence of these despots being tolerated as an open secret," says Roth. - ARCS, GMANews.TV Next: Squad killers' cleansing spree spreads out of Davao