Dead men tell tales

Forensic pathologist Raquel Fortun holds the skull of a drug war victim. (Photo: REUTERS/Eloisa Lopez)

The same day Aurora Blas found the body of her husband Thelmo in a Manila funeral home in 2016 with a bullet hole in his head, she signed a document provided by the mortician saying pneumonia had killed him. 

During the surge of vigilante-style killings under President Rodrigo Duterte, many were made to accept a falsified death certificate that failed to acknowledge that the loved ones they lost were casualties to the drug war, shot dead by unknown assailants.  

The crime scene

Thelmo Blas used methamphetamine to stay awake, working long shifts as a jeepney driver. Even with four kids, their family never went hungry. The entire neighborhood called Thelmo “tatay.” 

His police report said Caloocan City officers responding to reports of gunfire around 3 a.m. on August 1, 2016, found Thelmo’s body dumped at the roadside, face wrapped in masking tape. He was found with three sachets of shabu and a placard in Tagalog that read: “I am a pusher, do not copy me.” 

Police claimed that Aurora told them that Thelmo was “involved in illegal drug activities,” and that she had refused both an autopsy and an investigation into his death.

Aurora told Reuters she didn’t speak with police after Thelmo died, and that she wasn’t aware of the contents of the police report. 

As for the autopsy, Jade Funeral Homes had told Aurora that if she opted for one, she would have to pay more than fifteen thousand pesos. Without the money to spare, Aurora signed a waiver saying Thelmo had died of pneumonia and that she didn’t want an autopsy. 

The waiver is also a way for funeral homes to shield themselves from legal troubles should relatives later challenge the cause of death listed on the official death certificate.

When numbers lie

Six years later, Aurora’s desire to set the record straight has brought her to Raquel Fortun—one of only two forensic pathologists in the Philippines. With the consent of the families, Fortun is examining the exhumed remains of some of the poorest drug war victims to document how they died.

Dr. Fortun’s work suggests that the true extent of the drug war is far bigger than what the government has disclosed. The Philippine National Police puts the drug war death tally at 6,284. But rights activists and the International Criminal Court (ICC) have long argued that the number of people killed by Philippine police and vigilantes has been estimated around 30,000.

Last year, the ICC announced it would pursue an investigation on the extrajudicial killings but Duterte’s spokesperson has said his government “will not cooperate” with the ICC investigation, claiming it was “legally erroneous and politically motivated.” 

Incumbent Ferdinand Marcos Jr. has also indicated he would not help pursue the ICC’s case, as foreign probers were not needed in the country’s “functioning judiciary.”

Systemic problems

After shadowing Fortun for eleven months, Reuters found that the official death certificates of at least 15 drug war victims did not reflect the violent manner in which police and family members said they died. 

The 15 victims are but part of another larger audit conducted by the Medical Action Group, a Manila-based group of medical professionals. MAG looked at 107 cases that had death certificates citing natural causes of death, such as pneumonia or hypertension, as opposed to victims dying in encounters with law enforcement as said by relatives of the dead.  

Fortun has publicly lambasted the country’s procedures for death investigations with both the negligence of doctors and the police at fault.

While police have long hidden killings and destroyed or planted evidence at crime scenes, not only is there no mandatory training to certify deaths, doctors who sign death certificates are not required to examine the bodies—even for patients they don’t know. Physicians can turn to relatives of the deceased to provide a cause of death, a practice known as “verbal autopsy,” according to DOH guidelines.

Justice exhumed

Accurate death certificates are essential to a family’s ability to take legal action against alleged perpetrators of drug war atrocities. Erroneous death records obscure the true toll of the war on drugs. 

“When I’m there in the room with all of these skeletons, I feel that I’m giving them what was denied to them before,” Fortun said. “They were not given a proper investigation, no proper examination. So I’m trying to see what was missed.”