GRIEVING MOTHERS: Rosenda Lemita (left) and Imelda Evangelista stand next to the urns containing the cremated remains of their children, couple Ariel and Ana Mariz Evangelista (in framed photos), two of the nine activists killed in the “Bloody Sunday” raids conducted by the police and the military in three Luzon provinces on March 7, 2021. (File photo by GRIG C. MONTEGRANDE / Philippine Daily Inquirer)
MANILA, Philippines — In the official report of the Philippine National Police, activist Ariel Evangelista and his wife, Ana Mariz, resisted arrest and engaged law enforcers in a gunfight during a raid in Nasugbu, Batangas, at dawn on March 7, 2021.
That’s not, however, what the National Bureau of Investigation gathered from eyewitnesses, whose accounts of the couple’s “extrajudicial killing” (EJK) mainly formed the basis of the murder complaint the NBI filed on Friday against 17 policemen involved in the raid.
The officers were part of a bigger operation jointly conducted by the police and the military in the Calabarzon region that early morning. The simultaneous raids resulted in what militant groups would later condemn as the “Bloody Sunday” massacre.
The NBI said that on the day of the raid the Evangelistas were staying in a seaside cottage in Barangay Calayo and “forcibly taken” by the raiding team to another cottage, where they were later shot.
As the bureau put it in the complaint, what was done to the couple had the “peculiar nature of extrajudicial killing.”
The bureau was tasked by the Department of Justice (DOJ) to look into the conduct of the simultaneous raids that left a total of nine political activists dead. Aside from the Evangelistas, six others were killed in Rizal province and another in Cavite. The operations also led to the arrest of six people.
On Friday, the NBI filed a murder complaint in the DOJ against 17 members of the PNP’s Criminal Investigation and Detection Group (CIDG) in connection with the Nasugbu operation.
Eyewitness testimonies and the evidence gathered “would reveal the [officers’] deliberate intent to kill,” the bureau said.
It was discovered, for example, that the Evangelistas were not even residents of the house in Barangay Calayo that was the subject of the search warrant issued by a Manila judge to the PNP-CIDG.
The house cited in the warrant actually belonged to Anatalio Lemita, who also owned some cottages in the area and was then sleeping in his bedroom when the police arrived.
No videos
Upon entering Lemita’s house, the officers, who wore balaclavas, or ski masks, “despite the cover of darkness,” quickly went out to look for their target couple, eventually finding them in a nearby cottage along with their 10-year-old son, the NBI said in the six-page complaint.
“Ana Mariz was shouting and crying for help while being held by a member of the operating team outside the cottage. Soon thereafter, Ariel went out of the cottage,” it added. “Ariel and Ana Mariz were [then] forcibly taken and brought to Anatalio’s house, where they were found dead in the bedroom after an alleged gunfight.”
Moments before the killing, some members of the raiding team stood guard outside Lemita’s home, “telling the occupants of the nearby house to close the windows and warning other guests of Lemita’s cottages not to take videos.”
“Then, gunshots were heard.”
The NBI also noted that a certain Mark Ryan Lopez, the informant who tipped off the police about the unlicensed firearms and explosives allegedly kept by the Evangelistas, “wrongfully” tagged Lemita’s house as the couple’s residence.
The slain couple were members of Ugnayan ng Mamamayan Laban sa Pagwawasak ng Kalikasan at Kalupaan, a community organization that monitors the impact of ecotourism projects in Batangas, according to the human rights watchdog Karapatan.
‘Occupational risks’
Named as respondents in the NBI complaint were Police Lt. Col. Joseph Nandu, Police Lt. Arjay Santos, Police Master Sergeants Rafael Roque and Mark Tolentino, Police Staff Sergeants Elvern Cacatlan, Rodel Sillacay and Edgar Brinas, and Police Corporals Aldrin Gabrillo and Allen Lugue.
Also included were Patrolmen Julio Bautista, Ray Boom Boom Dalingay, Grizzly Paras, Rogelio Ninolla, Ruel Tenoso, Rich John Melniel Tumacder, Renzo Santos and Mark Lester Padul.
PNP chief General Dionardo Carlos on Saturday said he had ordered CIDG director Maj. Gen. Albert Ignatius Ferro to ensure the 17 respondents would be available for the DOJ proceedings.
Carlos, however, maintained the legitimacy of the Calabarzon raids, saying the CIDG personnel were only carrying out court orders.
He said the PNP would extend all legal assistance to the respondents, noting that the NBI complaint was “among the occupational risks faced by police arising from service-related circumstances and regular performance of duty.”
Include Sinas, Parlade
“At any rate, the PNP respects the legal action of the NBI in bringing the case up for prosecution before the DOJ,” Carlos noted. “This will allow the respondents the opportunity to face their accusers and present their side in the best interest of due process.”
“We are confident that this indictment is not enough to dampen the resolve of the CIDG or any other PNP unit in pursuing the objectives of the PNP against terrorism and criminality,” he said.
Also on Saturday, Karapatan called on the DOJ to include in the “Bloody Sunday” investigations retired PNP chief Gen. Debold Sinas, former Calabarzon police chief Brig. Gen. Felipe Natividad (now director of the PNP Special Action Force) and former provincial command chiefs Col. Rex Malimban (Batangas) and Col. Marlon Santos (Cavite) owing to their “command responsibility for the said incidents.”
Karapatan secretary general Cristina Palabay also called for the inclusion of retired Army Lt. Gen Antonio Parlade, former chief of the military’s Southern Luzon Command and spokesperson for the National Task Force to End Local Communist Armed Conflict (NTF-Elcac), which regards activist groups as fronts of the leftist insurgency.
Palabay also said two Manila Regional Trial Court judges — Jason Zapanta and Jose Lorenzo dela Rosa — should also be put under scrutiny over the warrants they issued for the raids.
President Rodrigo Duterte himself should also be held accountable for the “Bloody Sunday” deaths, Palabay said, adding: “Justice cannot be served selectively in dribs and drabs: all those culpable for these crimes should be brought to justice.”