24 drug suspects gunned down by Camanava cops

The Northern Police District said 24 people were killed in its Oplan Sama Sama, a program in line with the PNP’s Double Barrel antidrug operation, from Thursday morning to early Friday.

A list sent to the Inquirer by NPD director Chief Supt. Robert Fajardo showed that of the 24 drug suspects who were “neutralized,” at least 13 were from Caloocan, five from Valenzuela, two from Navotas, and one from Malabon.

The suspects were killed as they fought the police, Fajardo said.

“These are just normal operations. We have been doing a lot of operations even before. We are No. 1 in terms of the number of Oplan Double Barrel operations,” he said.

One officer was wounded in an encounter with the suspects.

At least 167 suspects have been “neutralized” from March 1 to Aug. 18 this year, according to the police district’s report.

Fajardo said the recent operations also resulted in the arrest of 36 others, bringing to 2,886 the number of suspects who have been nabbed since March 1.

In Malabon City, Senior Supt John Chua said Rolando Liwanag, 51, was shot dead in an encounter with the city police’s drug enforcement unit on Interior Kaingin Street around 8 p.m. on Thursday.

Police recovered at the scene a .38-caliber revolver, four live bullets, six sachets of “shabu” and a portable weighing scale.

PO3 Joey Ogatia of the Navotas police said two suspects, Alias Pogi and Conrado Bagasig, became aggressive and tried to shoot it out with officers. The officers fired back, killing them.

Regarding the Grade 12 pupil, Kian Loyd delos Santos, who was killed in Caloocan City, Fajardo said he had received reports the boy was involved in illegal drugs.

“You know, in these times, the young and the old get used for drugs,” he said. “We are investigating the case already.”

Fajardo said that President Duterte’s war on drugs is fairly simple.

“If [the drug suspects] do not stop, we will not stop as well. We do not want to kill … if the suspects are unarmed and do not retaliate. The problem is, what if we will be the one who will get killed?” he said.

The Caloocan City police gave a detailed report on the deaths of nine suspects in the antidrug operations in the city, indicating that all nine were killed within nine hours late Wednesday night up to the early hours on Thursday.

Based on police reports, all the suspects had guns and packets of shabu, or crystal methamphetamine, and all of them fired at the policemen first.

PO2 Joseph Papa of Police Community Precinct 4 was hit in the abdomen during a buy-bust operation where two suspects were killed.

The Caloocan police chief, Senior Supt. Chito Bersaluna, said the operations would continue “as long as there are drug pushers, addicts and users.”