More senators back death penalty

The push to revive the death penalty gained more supporters in the Senate, as more bills were filed to bring it back to life.

Sen. Ronald “Bato” dela Rosa formally filed his version that would impose death on drug traffickers and manufacturers, as did Sen. Panfilo “Ping” Lacson, who wanted the penalty to cover other heinous crimes.

Earlier, Senators Manny Pacquiao and Christopher Lawrence “Bong” Go filed their own versions.

Opposition

The proposals are expected to be met with opposition from the Catholic Church and human rights groups, who contend that imposing the death penalty does not deter criminals, and that it only tends to target the poor.

Lacson’s measure seeks to impose the death penalty on those who commit plunder, treason, qualified piracy, qualified bribery, parricide, murder, rape, kidnapping and serious illegal detention, robbery with homicide, destructive arson, drug trafficking and other related drug offenses, human trafficking and arms smuggling.

It prescribes the use of lethal injection to carry out the punishment.

In pushing for the measure, Lacson said the “alarming surge of heinous crimes in recent years” showed that imposing reclusion perpetua as the harshest penalty did not prove to be a deterrent.

Rule of law

“Hence, to reinstate public order and the rule of law, there is an impending need to revisit and reimpose the death penalty on certain heinous crimes,” he said.

Dela Rosa, for his part, believes it would be easier to revive the death penalty if it would be limited to drug trafficking.

He said a frequent criticism of the measure was that it was antipoor, but drug traffickers tended to be rich and powerful.

“There are no poor drug traffickers, many of them are big time, so I expect support from my colleagues,” Dela Rosa said.

He is also hoping that the Catholic Church would support his measure, since he said the Bible also speaks of the death penalty.