‘Death squad’

MASQUERADING in any other name, a death squad will smell just as obnoxious. When we were kids, it was quite a thrill watching “cowboy” movies, with townfolk volunteers on horseback organized by the sheriff – they were called “posse” – going after the bad guy who just bolted from the town jail.

In many of those films, the “bad guy” happened to be the hero in the story who most often outwitted the posse, thus, the group galloped back to town empty-handed.

The California gold rush in the mid1800s attracted hordes of escaped convicts, bank robbers, hired killers, rapists from all over the United States. They continued raking in money freely from their nefarious activities in the mining state.

Undermanned and ill-equipped, offices of county marshals announced the fielding of ordinary menfolk that would go after the criminals on the loose, buoyed with hefty reward money. The recruits were labelled as “bounty hunters.”

As what we have seen in those Western movies, the bounty hunters were an efficient anti-crime pack. Criminals who fought with the hunters were quickly eliminated by .38 caliber hot lead. And those who survived were brought to the nearest oak tree where a ring of a prepared five-inch-diameter manila cordage was slipped around the bad guy’s neck.

Some decades later, in the city of Rio de Janeiro in Brazil, authorities indiscreetly initiated the formation of “civilian volunteers” – actually, composed mostly of off-duty policemen – that went after drug dealers and users.

They spared no one pumping bullets into suspects and known criminal cohorts. From corrupt court judges who acquitted illegal drug traffickers, to policemen on the take, to housewives and young maidens, and even young boys aged 15.

Then law enforcers in Colombia and Nicaragua followed and went even bolder in giving name to their organization – the death squads. Political opponents and litigants in civil cases against powerful officials were in the hit list.

We are all familiar with “vigilantes.” They can easily hide under the cloak of anonymity. The “phantom law enforcers” were ready to snap off the lives of persons involved in criminal cases but were temporarily out on bail.

Or, the “vigilantes” could be members of a criminal syndicate who were rivals in their area of operation. There were persistent reports that rogue policemen were hired by rival groups to augment their diminishing manpower.

Every now and then, we read in the papers about “vigilantes” making known their existence by leaving a cardboard poster slung around the neck of a dead suspect.

And now we have the feared “death squad.” It did not mean much until two former policemen from Davao City came out in the open to tell the world of its existence in that southern city for years now.

Appearing in Senate investigations in 2017, they said they were bothered by their conscience, and feared the wrath of eternal punishment by the Almighty.

The two policemen testified in detail on their participation in the execution of criminals, bombing of a religious sect’s place of worship, and the killing of a broadcast media practitioner.

Amid these accounts, came the newest shocking development – Malacañang let the word out that the President is “planning” to mount another version of a “death squad.”

The objective: To counter whatever bloody trail that the NPA’s “Sparrow Units” may spread again in their bold sorties into urban centers of the country.

Should the formation materialize, it will be an “official death squad.”

But a vigilant multi-sector bloc is strongly putting a roadblock down.

“No, but the idea is still in the drawing board,” came the snappy retort from the presidential mouthpiece.

He added, if ever, the planned “government teams of assassins” would not violate due process because they will only run after criminals who will assassinate “government officials and innocent civilians.”

Sir, please make sure the phrase “mistaken identity” is not in their manual of operation.