MANILA (UCAN): Police Master Sergeant Hensie Zinampan was arrested on May 31 for killing a 52-year-old woman in front of her young granddaughter in a murder that has shocked the nation.
The shooting of Lilybeth Valdez in Quezon City, Metro Manila, was caught on camera and uploaded to social media. Footage shows Zinampan pulling Valdez to him by her hair as he shot her. It is believed he accosted the woman over a conflict he had with her son.
The policeman appeared to be drunk when he shot Valdez in the head at point-blank range during an altercation outside a grocery store.
The killing has drawn condemnation across the country.
Divine Word Father Flavie Villanueva called the killing brutal and a product of the “culture of death” encouraged by the country’s president, Rodrigo Duterte.
‘This is what happens when the leader of the nation declares kill, kill, kill … Not only policemen become emboldened but anyone who has a gun becomes empowered to kill,’
Father Flavie Villanueva
Father Villanueva a vocal critic of Duterte, accused him of encouraging policemen to kill without just cause.
“This is what happens when the leader of the nation declares kill, kill, kill … Not only policemen become emboldened but anyone who has a gun becomes empowered to kill,” Father Villanueva said in a social media post, referring to comments made by Duterte in March about how security forces should deal with rebels and criminals
“If there’s an encounter and you see them armed, kill. Kill them, don’t mind human rights. I will be the one to go to prison, I don’t have qualms,” Duterte reportedly said.
Father Villanueva said killings like Valdez’s would not be the last if police were being encouraged to carry them out by their commander-in-chief.
“It’s come to this, a 52-year-old feeble grandmother being shot,” he lamented.
“Thou shalt not kill. Does this have any meaning to us today? The words of any president or commander-in-chief become an unwritten policy, especially when expressed in public and with conviction,” Father Villanueva said.
“The consequence of Duterte’s words is a disillusioned cop thinking that it is all right to use violence and force to inflict fear and get away with murder,” he said.
