Bato, Go, Aguirre, 5 others bared as Du30 ‘co-perpetrators’
The International Criminal Court (ICC) has disclosed the names of eight former and current officials, including Senators Ronald “Bato” dela Rosa and Christopher “Bong” Go, who were identified by the Office of the Prosecutor (OTP) as part of the “hierarchy” in ex-President Rodrigo Duterte’s brutal drug war.
Together, they wielded “de facto authority” over those who pulled the trigger—the local police and other gunmen who were at the bottom of the chain of command of assassins that originated from the Davao Death Squad (DDS) when Duterte was city mayor, according to a document made public on Saturday by the ICC’s Pre-Trial Chamber I (PTC I).
The “lesser redacted” version of the OTP’s July 24, 2025, preconfirmation brief was released ahead of the confirmation of charges hearings, set to start on Feb. 23 in The Hague, the Netherlands, where the PTC I will determine whether Duterte will be tried on the charge of crime against humanity of murder.
The others who wielded authority over the triggermen who were identified in the document were former Justice Secretary Vitaliano Aguirre II, who allegedly gave them legal assistance and two former Davao City police chiefs—Vicente Danao Jr. who later became the Philippine National Police counterintelligence chief and Isidro Lapeña, who became the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency (PDEA) chief.
‘Project Double Barrel’
Also on the list were Oscar Albayalde, former National Capital Region police chief who succeeded Dela Rosa as PNP chief; Camilo Cascolan, a former PNP chief; Dante Gierran, former National Bureau of Investigation chief, who headed the NBI Davao region.
The OTP included other PNP officers and high-ranking government officials but did not identify them.
The document, signed by ICC Deputy Prosecutor Mame Mandiaye Niang, said that the drug war killings became “widespread” when Duterte took office as President in 2016 and appointed his top police officials to implement “Project Double Barrel” directed by Dela Rosa.
By the time Duterte stepped down six years later, officials said over 6,200 people were killed, excluding the hundreds more killed from November 2011—the start of the OTP’s reckoning period for the killings. Human rights groups say the figure could reach 30,000, most of them poor people.
Duterte and his eight co-perpetrators “shared a common plan or agreement to ‘neutralize’ alleged criminals in the Philippines, including those perceived or alleged to be associated with drug use, sale or production, through violent crimes including murder,” the document reads.
Even before the scheme was scaled up at the national level, the DDS “followed a similarly hierarchical structure with Duterte at the top, as the head of the DDS.” “At the bottom were the DDS members who physically carried out the crimes (generally nonpolice hit men or low-level police), who were subordinated to police or barangay handlers,” the document said.
It said that the “handlers” of the hit men reported to “a combination of police and co-perpetrators,” particularly Dela Rosa (in 2012-2013), Danao (2013-2016), Sonny Buenaventura, a police officer and Duterte’s driver and bodyguard, and Go, who in turn reported to Duterte.
“Duterte’s approval was required for DDS members to conduct killings in Davao City,” it noted.
Will they be arrested now?
The identification of Dela Rosa, Go and the others does not indicate their imminent arrest, human rights lawyer Kristina Conti told the Inquirer, adding that a warrant for any of them “will not automatically come from this disclosure.”
“It will be kept confidential in order to ensure enforcement,” she said.
“The OTP still retains some prosecutorial discretion as to who it will bring to court, based on its prosecutorial strategy to charge the ‘most responsible.’ So they could choose to go after any or all of those named,” she pointed out.
But Conti, an ICC assistant to counsel, said that it was “highly likely” that the ICC would issue arrest warrants against them. One of them, Cascolan, has died.
“[The theory of the OTP is that] this group of eight facilitated the scaling up of what was then a local antidrug campaign in Davao,” Conti said. “In this case, the nationalization of the drug war itself was what really took it to the level of crimes against humanity.”
Conti said that while the names of the co-perpetrators would likely be read during the confirmation of charges hearing that will begin on Feb. 23, they would not be tried in the same case.
76 murders cited
The case against Duterte alleges that he was “criminally responsible” for the murder specifically of 76 people and the attempted murder of two more. These comprise the three counts of murder as a crime against humanity against him.
The victims so far named in the redacted document are 17-year-old Kian delos Santos, whose brutal killing sparked public outcry, and 43-year-old Benjamin Visda, who was on a barangay drug list.
The “high-value” targets were Albuera Mayor Rolando Espinosa Sr. and drug suspect Raul Yap, both shot dead inside a jail cell in Leyte; and Ozamiz City Mayor Reynaldo Parojinog Sr., who was killed in his own house after Duterte publicly announced that he was on a drug list.
Kaufman: ‘Lacking in truth’
Duterte’s lead counsel, Nicholas Kaufman, said on Saturday that the defense will prove that the allegations against Dela Rosa and the others were “completely lacking in truth,”
“None of these co-perpetrators are, in my opinion, currently subject to arrest warrants,” he said in a statement sent to the Inquirer. “It flies in the face of prosecutorial logic to seek further warrants in the Philippines situation before the decision of the Appeals Chamber on the former President’s jurisdictional challenge.”
The British-Israeli lawyer was referring to the pending challenge to the Nov. 14, 2025, PTC I ruling that the ICC had jurisdiction over Duterte’s case.
Kaufman said that Duterte himself was aware of the identities of the eight alleged co-perpetrators for almost a year now and had kept them in confidence “as required by the court.”
“I had a brief meeting with the Prosecution last week and stated that for the parties to make meaningful submissions at confirmation for the benefit of the public, the document containing the charges would have to be less redacted,” he said.
Hiding since November
Dela Rosa has been in hiding since November after Ombudsman Jesus Crispin Remulla said, without proof, that the ICC had issued a warrant against him.
Dela Rosa, Go, Aguirre and the others, who were confidants of Duterte since he was Davao mayor, are not yet considered suspects at this stage, according to Conti.
She said that she didn’t see any significance in the disclosure of the name at this point but that it was possible that their identities would be revealed anyway on Feb. 23, or that applications for the their warrants of arrests had been made.
“I don’t know about this play, but hopefully this disclosure doesn’t lower the chances of someone else [apart from Duterte] getting arrested,” Conti said.
She said that of the eight named, Dela Rosa was “definitely in the picture” and none of the others were “as closely linked” to “Oplan Tokhang” as the ex-PNP chief.
As for Go, who once served as special assistant to the president, Conti said it would depend on the Court’s understanding of his role in the drug war.
‘Rewards system’
Go is accused of facilitating a “rewards system” for those who carried out the bloody antidrug campaign.
“So he might have been indispensable as a wallet, or he might have been consciously involved as the chief financial officer of the drug war … but definitely his name will always be brought up in the hearings and that would have a political effect,” she said. “If he is always dragged into such a public case only for the ICC not to file a case against him, people will ask why?”
Mamamayang Liberal Rep. Leila de Lima said the ICC’s disclosure “made the world smaller” not just for Duterte but also for his closest associates, who are believed to be the architects of the war on drugs.
She did warn, however, that those named would “go into hiding, joining Bato on the lam.”
“Like Duterte, they did not listen. Mayayabang pa sila (they were even arrogant about it),” said the former senator and justice secretary, whose vocal opposition to Duterte’s bloody campaign cost her seven years in detention over trumped-up drug charges.
“No matter,” De Lima said, “justice will always catch up with them. It’s time to be held accountable for the killing of fellow Filipinos! It’s time to pay for crimes against humanity!” —WITH A REPORT FROM INQUIRER RESEARCH
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