Speed up drug cases to decongest jails

Philippine jails are bursting at the seams. About 9,000 pushers have been put behind bars since July 1. They are now awaiting long trial. More are expected under President Rody Duterte’s war on drugs. Before that started, provincial and city detention centers already were four times overcapacity. Detainees literally have to take turns sleeping; showers are afforded only once a week; sickness abounds from unsanitary conditions. If no one is escaping, it is only out of fear of being shot dead the next time the arresters come.

Erecting new jails naturally would take months. Now more than ever is it urgent to hurry up the disposition of criminal cases. Perhaps the President and Chief Justice Maria Lourdes Sereno can work out ways without sacrificing due process. Senate President Aquilino Pimentel III and Speaker Pantaleon Alvarez can help with emergency legislation and fund allocations.

Policies need harmonizing among the three separate government branches. That may require a judicial summit of the five highest officials of the land. It helps that Duterte, Vice President Leni Robredo, Pimentel, Alvarez, and Sereno are lawyers of varied experience.

No. 1 on their agenda would be a streamlining of procedures. Not only lawmen and prosecutors must quicken interagency paperwork within the Executive. Between the Executive and Judiciary, prosecutors and judges also must prioritize drug case evaluation, filing, and trial. Additional personnel would be needed. Congress may enact a seconding of private lawyers, and law and criminology students as extra hands.

Agenda No. 2 would be what to do with the 600,000 pushers and addicts who have turned themselves in to barangay and police stations. With no place to keep them, they merely were listed down then sent home. All have confessed to non-bailable crime. Shall there be a general amnesty for surrenderers, along with a massive drug rehab program?

Fortuitously Duterte and Sereno quickly patched up the other week their differences. They know from where each is coming, and so can be trusted to cooperate for the common good.

Their clash had to do with contrasting approaches. Duterte resorted to naming and shaming 163 politicos, cops, and judges allegedly linked to the narco-trade. He employed shock and awe to make them report within 24 hours to the Philippine National Police headquarters, under pain of “shoot on sight.” It was unorthodox – unexpected of a veteran state prosecutor that Duterte once was. Yet it was for Duterte the effective way too, having gotten results as mayor for two decades of Davao City. Now he is expanding it nationwide. The country is on the brink of becoming a narco-state. Desperate times call for desperate measures.

Sereno understandably stuck to constitutional strictures. That meant no surrendering without formal court charges. And court charges take time to study and type up. In accepting Duterte’s public apology for harsh wordings, the Chief Justice said through a spokesman that she understood the President’s intentions. Presumably the Supreme Court justices noticed that even before Duterte’s name-and-shame speeches, three town mayors already publicly admitted to narco-trafficking. They would have heard the news about a mayor pointing to his son as the town narco-lord, yet doing nothing about it in utter neglect of public duty. Surely they know that some judges do habitually let drug indictees off the hook.

The Executive, Legislative, and Judiciary separately are on the move. The police are working overtime gathering intelligence, buy-busting pushers, and processing arrestees and evidence. Jail wardens are striving to cope with the sudden influx of drug detainees. Regional rehab clinics are being expanded, and even military camps are being opened as addicts’ shelters.

The Supreme Court has been reorganizing and reorienting for faster casework in general. Case abbreviations and online submissions have been adopted. All regional trial courts are now authorized to handle drug cases. Congress is initiating bills in support of the war on drugs.

By coming together for a common agenda, the three branches can ensure victory against the drug scourge.

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