(Contributed photo)

MANILA - (UPDATED) Police on Friday took Senator Leila de Lima's mug shot at Camp Crame following her arrest at the Senate.

De Lima was arrested after a judge found merit in criminal charges filed by the Department of Justice last week.

De Lima has been detained in what police said was a decent detention cell at the Custodial Center in Camp Crame.

Prior to detention, De Lima maintained her innocence and claimed that her arrest was President Rodrigo Duterte's way of silencing critics.

"Clearly, this administration has evil and dangerous plans: to make an example of me to intimidate, silence, and destroy anyone who dares challenge them; to draw public attention away from the government’s abuses and failures; and to cover up their most murderous war on drugs," De Lima said in a video message recorded at the Senate prior to her arrest.

The embattled senator also vowed to face all charges against her which she has branded as "political persecution."

"The truth will come out and I will achieve justice. I am innocent," she told reporters shortly before law enforcers escorted her away from her office.

Apart from De Lima, her former driver and bodyguard Ronnie Dayan was also arrested.

De Lima, a human rights lawyer before joining government, said the charges are a vendetta against her after she last year led a Senate probe into alleged extrajudicial killings during Duterte's anti-drugs crackdown.

-- reports from Maan Macapagal, ABS-CBN News, Reuters