FIVE members of the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency (PDEA) in Dumaguete City, Negros Oriental have been relieved after it was discovered that they illegally arrested five targets during an anti-drug operation on July 28, 2020.
Judge Amelia Lourdes Mendoza of the Regional Trial Court Branch 34 in Dumaguete City also dropped the charges against the five suspects after a security camera footage showed that the PDEA agents lied about arresting them in an entrapment.
The judge sent a letter to PDEA Director General Wilkins Villanueva to inform him about the incident.
Villanueva immediately ordered the five agents to be placed under investigation.
PDEA 7 Director Levi Ortiz also issued an order relieving them and temporarily assigning them to the PDEA 7 office in Cebu City, pending their administrative and criminal investigation.
However, only two will be going to Cebu City as the other three had transferred to other regions.
The two agents will be placed in the administration holding office and will not be allowed to participate in anti-drug operations while they are under investigation.
“We sent them a memorandum asking them to explain. After that, they will be reassigned. Investigators from the national headquarters will come here to conduct the probe. If the five agents are found liable, criminal and administrative charges will be filed against them,” Ortiz said in Cebuano.
Ortiz added that the order to place the two agents under camp restriction and to charge them with criminal and administrative cases, if proven guilty, came from Villanueva.
Ortiz hopes the incident will serve as a lesson to PDEA agents nationwide not to engage in illegal operations, otherwise they will face the consequences. (AYB/CBQ)