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Police Promotion as Reward for ‘Drug War’ Killings? Truth Commission Seeks Probe

Several officers won higher rank or bigger commands after being linked to killings under former President Rodrigo Duterte.

MANILA (Oct. 14, 2026) — Some police commanders linked to killings in Rodrigo Duterte’s "drug war" campaign later won promotions or more powerful posts, according to an analysis of public records by the Truth Commission. The commission, which is investigating the killings, called on the Philippine government on Wednesday to launch an independent inquiry.

“Any inquiry must look at promotions as closely as it looks at cash payments,” said Dr. Christopher Magno, the commission’s executive director and an expert on state violence in the Philippines. “No police officer should gain in any way from the blood of people killed outside the law.”

Magno pointed to Reuters reporting that officers at the Batasan police station in Quezon City killed 108 people in drug operations from July 2016 to June 2017, while Lito Patay commanded the station. Within months, on Sept. 15, 2017, Patay was named chief of the Criminal Investigation and Detection Group in Central Luzon, a regional investigative unit. Ronald dela Rosa, then the national police chief, said the new post would make Patay eligible for promotion, citing the number of drug suspects who had surrendered. Patay has said his officers killed only in self-defense.

In Caloocan, the commission’s own records count 284 killings in 2016, before Chito Bersaluna took command of the city police, but 105 more such deaths occurred in the seven months he led it, February to August 2017. The figures cover all killings in the city, not only those in police operations. Bersaluna was removed from his post after officers killed Kian delos Santos, 17, in August 2017. He became police director of Bulacan Province in May 2018 and a brigadier general in March 2022.

Roberto Fajardo oversaw Caloocan as head of the Northern Police District and was also removed after Kian’s death but he went on to become chief of the Highway Patrol Group in June 2018. Police leaders defended both appointments, citing the officers’ records. Neither man had been charged in Kian’s killing.

Magno said the appointments alone do not prove that killings helped the officers advance, since a prized post can improve an officer’s chances of promotion before any change in rank. “But these career histories, in the context of the ‘war on drugs,’ still warrant an investigation,” he said.

DUTERTE’S PROMISE OF PARDON

Promises of protection could also shape how officers behaved, Magno said, adding that “a promise of pardon can eliminate an officer’s fear of punishment.” On March 31, 2017, Duterte said publicly that if police officers charged in the killing of Rolando Espinosa, the mayor of Albuera, were convicted, he would pardon them and restore them to duty with promotions. Their commander, Marvin Marcos, returned that July to a regional post in the investigative group. The officers were acquitted in 2021.

Cash paid for deaths is a separate kind of reward. In a 2017 report, Amnesty International quoted a police officer who said units received ₱8,000 to ₱15,000 for each person killed, split among the team, and nothing for arrests. Such a system would make a suspect’s death pay better than an arrest, Magno pointed out.

Hired gunmen were paid on a separate scale. Two of them told Amnesty that a police officer paid them in advance: ₱5,000 for each suspected drug user they killed and ₱10,000 to ₱15,000 for each suspected dealer. Their account suggests that the price depended on how the target was labeled.

“DAVAO MODEL”

Royina Garma, a retired police colonel, told a House committee in October 2024 that the “Davao model” proposed for the whole country moved money in two ways. One stream rewarded deaths, with payments ranging from ₱20,000 to ₱1 million. The other paid for operations, both by funding planned raids and by repaying costs afterward, and could apply even when a raid ended in an arrest.

Garma also described target lists, police reports, middlemen and bank accounts. Jovie Espenido, a police colonel, separately alleged that intelligence funds and gambling money paid for rewards that passed through police commanders. Officials have denied the allegations.

These accounts need to be checked against financial records, Magno said. “Investigators should follow the trail from the choice of a target to the payment of a reward. Investigators must track these flows of money separately.”

The commission wants investigators to match each death against police reports and financial records, as well as promotion recommendations and performance reviews. The inquiry should establish which achievements commanders rewarded and who signed off on payments or promotions. The government offers lawful rewards, in cash or other recognition, for documented drug seizures and arrests; investigators must separate these from payments for killings.

“Victims’ families deserve an investigation that reaches the officials who ordered the operations and those who rewarded them, with cash or with promotions,” Magno said. “Police careers should rest on protecting life and securing justice.” (Truth Commission)

Reference: Dr. Chris Magno info@truthcommission.ph