ABSTRACT
Critical analysis of the “War on Drugs” tend to focus on extrajudicial killings (EJK) and the role of police without paying much attention to other key feature and actors involved in the “War on Drugs” – namely, the role of courts and criminal process. This chapter argues, based on interviews with judges, public prosecutors, and public attorneys conducted in Manila, that judicial actors played a key role before and during the first stage of the “War on Drugs” maintaining a certain level of legality by controlling indirectly police behavior through the dismissal of cases or acquittal of the defendants. However, facing the massive influx of cases and the political pressures exerted by the executive, they strategically sought to reduce their exposure, while maintaining their legalizing function, by enabling plea bargaining for drug related cases. This constituted a turning point for judicial actors, but also for the very “War on Drugs,” although this was not apparent to the larger public. It is argued that enabling plea bargaining has had two key consequences: on the one hand, weak cases end up in a conviction, but on the other, judicial actors are able to reinsert a rehabilitation focus in the antidrug campaign.
