MANILA, Philippines — “Go there, you are free to kill everybody.”

This was President Rodrigo Duterte’s order to controversial police official Lt. Col. Jovie Espenido who was recently assigned to Bacolod City which is “badly hit” by illegal drugs.

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“Bacolod is badly hit (by illegal drugs) now. I placed Espenido there. I said, go there, you are free to kill everybody. Start killing there. Dalawa na lang tayo pa-preso,” Duterte said Thursday during his speech at the 45th Philippine Business Conference & Expo.

Espenido was police chief of Albuera, Leyte in 2016 when then mayor Rolando Espinosa Sr. was killed in his cell by cops who said they were serving a search warrant.

In 2017, Espenido was transferred to Ozamiz City and it was under his watch where then mayor Reynaldo Parojinog and 14 others linked to the drug trade were killed in a series of raids.

It was only last Wednesday when Espenido was assigned as deputy police director for operations of the Bacolod City Police Office.

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