FOURTEENTH CONGRESS 
) 
REPUBLIC OF THE PHILPPlNES 
1 
First Regular Session 
7 
AIJE 28 P3 3 G  
1 
SENATE BILL NO.- 1489 
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HV :- 
Introduced by Senator M. A. Madrigal 
EXPLANATORY NOTE 
Enforced disappearance is said to be the most cruel form of human rights violations. It is 
most cruel because the possibility of torture and murder of the victim is real, but closure for the 
victim’s family is almost impossible. 
In the Philippines, the repeated cases of enforced disappearances have established a 
systematic pattern that can only be considered a crime against humanity. 
During the martial law regime, there were at least 737 cases of disappearances, mostly of 
youth activists who were never to be seen or heard from again. The paffern has continued into the 
current administration of President Macapagal Arroyo which alone has to answer for 184 cases 
from 2001 to August 2007, 
However, no specific offense related to enforced disappearance has been recognized 
despite its unabated occurrence for the past decades. Existing criminal laws, particularly on 
kidnapping, illegal detention and murder, do not suffice to cover enforced disappearances, the 
circumstances of which occur after or without official arrest or custody. Current laws are also 
insufficient to punish its perpetrators and fail to capture the gravity of the issue. 
This bill seeks to fill this void by defining and penalizing the crime of enforced or 
involuntary disappearance. It recognizes that enforced disappearance needs its own penal law 
primarily because the crime is commissioned by the State or agents acting at its supposed behest 
and behalf, instead of against it. The bill is meant not only as an instrument of prosecution and 
punishment, but also as a mechanism for protection and deterrence. 
Other salient provisions of this bill include: prohibiting secret detention places, 
establishing duties of agents of the state, establishing the criminal liability even for accomplices 
and superiors of the perpetrators of enforced disappearances, obligating the government to 
maintain an updated official register of desapurecidos, requiring immediate investigations and a 
regular report on actions taken regarding enforced disappearances, allowing access to any place 
where there are reasonable grounds to believe the desuparecido may be present, providing 
restitution to victims and their next of kin, and ensuring education and training regarding this Act 
among law enforcers. 
This bill upholds the International Convention for the Protection of All Persons from 
Enforced Disappearance which to date awaits the country’s signing and ratification. 
For the sake of all those who will never have a grave to their name, approval of this bill is 
most urgently sought so that the crime done to them may never be repeated. 
M. A. MADRJ 


FOURTEENTH CONGRESS 
1 
First Regular Session 
1 
REPUBLIC OF THE PHILIPPINES 
) 
Introduced by Senator M. A. Madrigal 
AN ACT 
DEFINING AND PENALIZING THE CRIME OF ENFORCED 
OR INVOLUNTARY DISAPPEARANCE 
Be it enacted by the House of Representatives and the Senate of the Philippines in Congress assembled: 
SECTION 1. Short Title. - This Act shall be known as the “An Act Defining and Penalizing 
the Crime of Enforced or Involuntary Disappearance.” 
SECTION 2. Declaration of Policy. - The State values the dignity of every human being and 
guarantees full respect for human rights. Highest priority shall be given to the enactment of 
measures for the enhancement of the right of all people to human dignity, the prohibition against 
secret detention places, solitary, incommunicado, or other similar forms of detention, the 
provision for penal and civil sanctions for such violations, and compensation and rehabilitation 
for the victims and their families, particularly with respect to the use of torture, force, violence, 
threat, intimidation or any other means which vitiate the free will of persons abducted, arrested, 
detained, disappeared or otherwise removed from the effective protection of the law. 
SECTION 3. Definitions of Terms. - For purposes of this Act, the following terms shall mean: 
1. EnJorced or Involuntaiy Disappearance - Refers to the arrest, detention, abduction or 
any other form of deprivation of liberty, whether valid or otherwise, with or without a 
warrant, that are committed by agents of the State or by persons or groups of persons 
acting with the authorization, support or acquiescence of the State, followed by the 
refusal to acknowledge the deprivation of liberty or by concealment of the fate or 
whereabouts of the disappeared person, which place such a person outside the protection 
of the law. It is conclusively presumed that a person is removed from the protection of 
the law for a period of time of at most thirty-six (36) hours when the other elements or 
circumstances of enforced or involuntary disappearance concur. 
2. Victim of Enforced or Involuntary Dkappearance - Refers to any individual against 
whom the crime of enforced disappearance as defined above has been committed. 
SECTION 4. Prohibition on Secret Detention. - It is hereby prohibited to hold a person in 
secret detention. This includes any place, facility or location other than officially recognized 
detention centers of government instrumentalities and that are beyond the reach of adequate 
supervision, accountability or law. 
SECTION 5. No Legal Justification for Enforced Disappearance. - No order or instruction 
from any public authority, civilian, military or other, may be invoked to justify an offence of 
enforced or involuntary disappearance. 
An “Order of Battle,” official or otherwise, issued by the military, police or any law-enforcement 
agency of the Government, shall not justify an enforced disappearance and shall subject the 
persons involved in such act to the corresponding penalties provided in this Act. 
SECTION 6. Rights of Persons Arrested, Detained or Deprived of Liberty. - It shall be the 
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absolute right of a person who has been arrested, detained or deprived of liberty to immediately 
inform hisiher family, relatives, lawyerh or a human rights organization by all means that are 
available and expeditious, by cellular phone, landline, courier, letter, electronic mail, telegram, 
radio or other means, on his or her whereabouts and condition. 
Any person depriving, denying or delaying such exercise of the victim’s right shall be subjected 
to the penalties under Section 12 hereof. 
SECTION 7. Duties of Agents of the State. - It shall be the duty of agents of the State or 
persons or groups of persons acting with the authorization, support or acquiescence of the State, 
who arrest, detain, order or enforce the deprivation of liberty of a person to ensure the following: 
1. To hold any person deprived of liberty only in officially recognized and supervised 
places of detention; 
2. To immediately report in writing on the circumstances and whereabouts of such person 
deprived of liberty to the nearest office of the Philippine National Police (PNP), Armed 
Forces of the Philippines (AFP), Department of Interior and Local Government (DILG), 
Department of National Defense (DND), the City or Provincial Public Prosecutor, the 
Commission on Human Rights (CHR) as well as the person’s family, relatives, lawyeds 
or to a human rights organization by the most expedient means; 
3. To allow any person deprived of liberty to communicate with and be visited by his or her 
family, counsel or any other person of his or her choice, subject only to the conditions 
established by law; 
4. To guarantee access by the competent and legally authorized authorities and institutions 
to the places where persons are deprived of liberty, if necessary with prior authorization 
from a judicial authority; 
5. To guarantee that any person deprived of liberty or, in the case of a suspected enforced 
disappearance, since the person deprived of liberty is not able to exercise this right, my 
persons with a legitimate interest, such as relatives of the person deprived of liberty, their 
representatives or their counsel, shall, in all circumstances, be entitled to take 
proceedings before a court, in order that the court may decide without delay on the 
lawfulness of the deprivation of liberty and order the person’s release if such deprivation 
of liberty is not lawfhl. 
6. To take the necessary measures to ensure that persons deprived of liberty are released in a 
manner permitting reliable verification that they have actually been released and to assure 
the physical integrity of such persons and their ability to exercise fully their rights at the 
time of release. 
Failure to perform these duties by negligence or otherwise shall subject agents of the State 
involved in the arrest, detention or deprivation of liberty of persons to the penalties under Section 
12 hereof. 
SECTION 8. Powers of Investigating Authority. Where there are reasonable grounds to 
believe that a person has been subjected to enforced disappearance, the Commission on Human 
Rights shall undertake an investigation, even if there has been no formal complaint. Said 
Commission shall - 
1. Have the necessary powers and resources to conduct the investigation effectively, 
including access to the documentation and other information relevant to their 
investigation; 
2. Have access, if necessary with the prior authorization of a judicial authority, which shall 
rule promptly on the matter, to any place of detention or any other place where there are 
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reasonable grounds to believe that the disappeared person may be present. 
3. Ensure that persons suspected of having committed an offence of enforced disappearance 
are not in a position to influence the progress of an investigation by means of pressure or 
acts of intimidation or reprisal aimed at the complainant, witnesses, relatives of the 
disappeared person or their defense counsel, or at persons participating in the 
investigation, 
SECTION 9. Duty of Person/s to Certify in Writing on the Results of Inquiry into a 
Possible Victim's Whereabouts. - In case a family member, relative, lawyerh, human rights 
organization or member of the media inquires With a member or official of any police or military 
detention center, tke Philippine National Police (PALP) or any of its agencies, the Armed Forces 
of the Philippines (AFP) or any of its agencies, the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI), or 
any other agency or instrumentality of the Government, as well as any hospital or morgne, public 
or private, on the presence or whereabouts of a reported victim of enforced disappearance, such 
member or official shall immediately issue a certification in writing to such inquiring person or 
entity on the presence or absence andor information on the whereabouts of such possible victim. 
The failure of such person to perform this mandatory duty shall subject him/her to the penalties 
under Section 12.2 hereof, regardless of whether or not the said victim turns out to be in their 
power, authority, control, or custody at the time of the inquiry. 
SECTION 10. Duty of InquestDnvestigating Public Prosecutor or any Judicial or Quasi- 
Judicial Employee or Official. - Any Inquest or Investigating Public Prosecutor or any judicial 
or quasi-judicial employee or official who learns of such disappearance and upon whom the 
victim of enforced disappearance is delivered for inquest or preliminary investigation or for any 
other judicial process, shall have the duty to immediately inform such circumstance and the 
victim's whereabouts to hisker immediate family, relative, or lawyerh or to a human rights 
organization by the most expedient means. 
The failure of such Inquest or Investigating Public Prosecutor or any judicial or quasi-judicial 
employee or official to perform this duty by negligence or otherwise shall subject himker to the 
penalties under Section 12.2 hereof. 
SECTION 11. Defying, Ignoring, or Unduly Delaying Compliance with a Judicial Order. - 
The penalties provided for in Section 12 hereof shall be imposed against any person who defies, 
ignores, or unduly delays compliance with a habeas corpus proceeding filed on behalf of the 
victim of enforced disappearance or to immediately follow or coniply with an order of release by 
virtue of such habeas corpus proceeding or other appropriate judicial order. 
SECTION 12. Penalties. - The following penalties shall be meted: 
1. The penalty of reclusion perpetual shall be meted upon the following persons for the 
commission of enforced disappearance - 
a. Those who directly committed the act of enforced disappearance; 
b. Those who directly force or induce others to commit the act of enforced 
disappearance; 
c. Those who cooperated in the act of enforced disappearance by another act without 
which the act of enforced of involuntary disappearance would not have been carried 
out; 
d. Those who allowed the act of enforced disappearance when it is within their power to 
stop the commission of such act; 
e. Those who cooperated in the execution of an act of enforced disappearance by 
previous or simultaneous acts. 
Provided, however, that should the victim be surfaced alive at or before the time of trial, 
the penalty next lower in degree shall be imposed. 
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2. The penalty of reclusion temporal shall be imposed on those who attempt to commit 
enforced disappearance, and on persons who having knowledge of the act of enforced 
disappearance but without having participated therein either as principals or accomplices 
took part subsequent to its commission in any of the following acts: 
a. By themselves profiting from or assisting the offender to profit from the effects of 
the act of enforced disappearance; 
b. By concealing the act of enforced disappearance, and/or destroying the effects or 
instruments thereof, in order to prevent its discovery; 
c. By harboring, concealing, or assisting in the escape of the offenders, whether 
principals or accomplices, in the act of enforced disappearance. 
Provided, hther, that the crime of enforced disappearance shall not prescribe. 
SECTION 13. Liability of Commanding Officer or Senior Official. - The immediate 
Commanding Officer or equivalent Senior Official shall be held criminally liable for an enforced 
disappearance by virtue of the doctrine of command responsibility. Any failure on hisher part, 
whether done with intent or negligence, to avert an act of enforced disappearance shall be taken 
as evidence of conspiracy. He/she shall be meted the penalty of reclusion perpetual. 
SECTION 14. Civil Liability. - Enforced disappearance shall render their perpetrators and the 
State authorities which organized, acquiesced in or tolerated such disappearances liable under 
civil law. 
SECTION 15. Liability Under Other National Criminal Laws. - The liability of the offender 
under this Act shall be independent of, in addition to, or without prejudice to prosecution and 
conviction for violation of other applicable laws including R.A. 7438 (An Act Defining Certain 
Rights of Person Arrested, Detained or Under Custodial Investigation, as well as Duties of the 
Arresting, Detaining and Investigating Officers and Providing Penalties Therefor) as well as the 
Revised Penal Code, including arbitrary detention, delay in the delivery of detained persons, 
delaying release, maltreatment of prisoners, unlawful arrest, incriminating innocent person, 
physical injuries, murder and any other appropriate criminal offenses in special laws. 
SECTION 16. Non-Exclusivity or Double Jeopardy Under International Law. - 
Notwithstanding the provisions of the foregoing section, any investigation, trial and decision in 
any Philippine court or other agency for any violation of this Act shall be without prejudice to 
any investigation, trial, decision or any other legal or administrative process before the 
appropriate international court or agency under applicable international human rights and 
humanitarian law. 
SECTION 17. Order of Superior Officer or Public Authority. - An order from a superior 
officers or a public authority cannot be invoked as justification for taking part in the commission 
of an enforced disappearance. 
SECTION 18. Continuing Offense. - An act constituting enforced disappearance shall be 
considered a continuing offense as long as the perpetrators continue to conceal the fate and the 
whereabouts of the persons who have disappeared and these facts remain unclarified. 
SECTION 19. Prescription. - There shall be no time limit to the prosecution of a person 
responsible for the commission of enforced disappearance. 
SECTION 20. Non-applicability of Amnesty. - Persons who have committed the act of 
enforced disappearance shall not benefit from any special amnesty law or similar measures that 
will have the effect of exempting them from any criminal proceedings and sanctions. 
SECTION 21. Incentives and Restrictions, - Any offender who volunteers information that 
leads to the discovery of the victim of enforced disappearance shall be immune from a criminal 
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charge under this Act and shall be exempt from criminal prosecution, provided said offender 
appears not to be the most guilty of the crime. 
The alleged perpetrators of and other participants in the commission of enforced disappearance 
shall be suspended and prohibited from performing any official duties or be the subject of 
promotion or reassignment of post during the pendency of the case, whether at the level of 
investigation, criminal or administrative, trial and appeaf of the case. 
SECTION 22. Protection of Victims, Their Families, Legal Counsels, Human Rights 
Organizations, Media and Witnesses of Enforced Disappearance. - The State through its 
appropriate agencies shall ensure the safety of all persons involved in the search, investigation 
and prosecution of cases of enforced disappearance including the victims, their families, 
complainants, witnesses, representatives of human rights organizations, members of media and 
legal counsels. They shall likewise be protected from any act of intimidation or reprisal as a 
result of the filing of charges. Anyone committing such acts shall be held criminally liable. 
SECTION 23. Compensation to Next-of-Kin of a Victim of Enforced Disappearanee. -The 
next-of-kin of a victim of enforced disappearance may claim for compensation as provided for 
under Republic Act 7309 and other relief programs of the Government, primarily, but not limited 
to, financial compensation and without prejudice to other legal remedies that may be available to 
him or her. 
SECTION 24. Rehabilitation of Surfaced Victim. - The State shall provide for the 
indemnification and rehabilitation free of charge of a victim of enforced disappearance. He or 
she shall be entitled to monetary compensation and restitution of honor and reputation, without 
prejudice to other legal remedies that may be available to him or her. Such restitution of honor 
and reputation shall include immediate expunging or rectification of any derogatory record, 
information or public declaratiodstatement on hisher personal circumstances, status, person, or 
affiliation by the appropriate government or private agency or agencies concerned. 
SECTION 25. Implementing Rules and Regulations. - The Department of Justice and the 
Commission on Human Rights, in regular consultation and close coordination with organizations 
of victims of human rights violations shall promulgate the rules and regulations for the effective 
implementation of this Act, and shall ensure the full public dissemination of such. 
SECTION 26. Monitoring of Compliance. - A Monitoring Group is hereby created to 
regularly monitor and check compliance with this Act. A Commissioner of the Commission on 
Human Rights shall head the Group which shall have the following as members: 
1. One undersecretary of the Department of Justice; 
2. One representative from the Senate Committee on Justice and Human Rights; 
3. One representative from the House Committee on Civil, Political and Human Rights; 
4. One representative from the Senate Committee on Oversight; 
5. One representative from the House Committee on Oversight; 
6. Representatives of non-government human rights organizations known to be actively 
involved in cases of enforced or involuntary disappearance. 
SECTION 27. Official Register. - The Commission on Human Rights, in coordination with 
the Philippine National Police (PNP), Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP), Department of 
Interior and Local Government (DILG), Department of National Defense (DND), the City or 
Provincial Public Prosecutor and human rights organizations, shall compile and maintain an up- 
to-date official register and/or records of victims of enforced disappearance and all other persons 
that have been arrested, detained or deprived of liberty, which shall be made promptly available 
upon request. The information contained therein shall include, as a minimum: 
1. The identity of the person deprived of liberty; 
2. The date, time and place where the person was deprived of liberty and the identity of the 
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authority that deprived the person of liberty; 
3. The authority that ordered the deprivation of liberty and the grounds for the deprivation 
of liberty; 
4. The authority responsible for supervising the deprivation of liberty; 
5. The place of deprivation of liberty, the date and time of admission to the place of 
deprivation of liberty and the authority responsible for the place of deprivation of liberty, 
including, in the event of a transfer to another place of deprivation of liberty, the 
destination and the authority responsible for such transfer; 
6. Elements relating to the state of health of the person deprived of liberty; 
7. In the event of death during the deprivation of liberty, the circumstances and cause of 
death and the destination of the remains; 
8. The date and time of release or transfer to another place of detention, the destination and 
the authority responsible for the transfer. 
SECTION 28. Education and Training. The Government shall ensure that the training of law 
enforcement personnel, civil or military, medical personnel, public officials and other persons 
who may be involved in the custody or treatment of any person deprived of liberty includes the 
necessary education and information regarding the relevant provisions of this Act, in order to: 
1. Prevent the involvement of such officials in enforced disappearances; 
2. Emphasize the importance of prevention and investigations in relation to enforced 
disappearances; 
3. Ensure that the urgent need to resolve cases of enforced disappearance is recognized. 
SECTION 29. Suppletory Application of the Revised Penal Code. - The provisions of the 
Revised Penal Code on punishable offenses shall be suppletory to this Act. 
SECTION 30. Sources of Funds. - The funds necessary for the implementation of this Act 
shall be included in the budgets of the Commission on Human Rights and Department of Justice 
under the General Appropriations Act of the year following the enactment of this Act. 
SECTION 31. Repealing Clause. - All laws, decrees, executive orders, rules and regulations 
and other issuances or parts thereof inconsistent with the provisions of this Act are hereby 
repealed or amended accordingly. 
SECTION 32. Separability Clause. - If, for any reason, any section or provision of this Act is 
declared unconstitutional or invalid, such other sections or provisions not affected thereby shall 
remain in full force and effect. 
SECTION 33. Effectivity. - This Act shall take effect fifieen (15) days upon its publication in 
at least two (2) newspapers of national circulation. 
Approved, 
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