THE dismissal by a Muntinlupa City court of all the remaining drug charges against former senator Leila de Lima last week and the conviction of four police officers earlier this month for the killing of a father and son during the bloody war on illegal drugs raise serious questions on how justice was pursued in former president Rodrigo Duterte's administration.

In February 2017, the Department of Justice, then under Vitaliano Aguirre II, filed three separate drug cases against de Lima. Relying mostly on the testimony of convicted drug offenders, prosecutors alleged that de Lima benefited from the illegal drug trade inside the New Bilibid Prison. She was later ordered detained at the custodial center inside Camp Crame in Quezon City.