Court orders ballistic tests on slugs taken from Maguindanao massacre victims

MANILA, Philippines—A Quezon City court has ordered ballistic tests conducted on bullet slugs recovered from some of the Maguindanao massacre victims but lay forgotten in a desk drawer for more than a year.

The Philippine National Police’s Firearms Identification Division was tasked to run ballistic examinations on the slugs and metal fragments, which had been kept in a medical examiner’s desk until last year.

The fact that the evidence lay in Senior Inspector Felino Brunia’s desk drawer from November 2009 to February 2011 did not automatically mean that the slugs and fragments were already “contaminated.”

“The court finds no merit in the accused’s claim that the slugs and fragments are already contaminated due to passage of time and therefore have lost their probative value,” the five-page order read.

Judge Jocelyn Solis-Reyes of Regional Trial Court Branch 221 gave the PNP-FAID a month to complete the tests and submit its findings to the court.

The slugs and metallic fragments, which Brunia recovered from five of 14 cadavers he autopsied, will be turned over to the investigating unit as well.

In an order dated March 8, the court said it was necessary for ballistic tests to be conducted on the evidence to determine the caliber and other properties of the slugs.

The court ordered the examination of the fragments and slugs after Brunia testified that he still had in his desk drawer bullet slugs and fragments he recovered from some cadavers he autopsied after the Nov. 23, 2009, massacre.

The evidence had not yet been subjected to ballistic tests when Brunia testified in court, prompting the prosecution to ask for a ballistic examination to be conducted on the evidence.

The defense opposed the prosecution’s motion, saying the slugs were already “contaminated evidence” and that there was no way to confirm that the slugs to be examined are indeed the ones that Brunia had.

For its part, the prosecution maintained that they were able to “unequivocally establish” the identity of the slugs and fragments and that Brunia had “exclusive control and custody” of the evidence.

The court found merit in the prosecution’s motion.

“There exists a presumption that the preservation of the slugs was observed in regular performance of his duty,” the order said.

Reyes also noted the testimony of Dr. Tomas Dimaandal, also a medical examiner, who said gunpowder cannot damage copper and lead even with the passage of time.

In his testimony last year, Brunia said he forgot that he still had the slugs with him as he thought that he had submitted all the evidence with the medico-legal reports he wrote.

The slugs and fragments were kept inside a wooden table with three drawers at his office in Mindanao.

Members of the Ampatuan clan are among the 196 persons charged with murdering 57 people on Nov. 23, 2009, in Ampatuan town, Maguindanao province.