Five personnel of the Philippine National Police-Health Service (PNP-HS) will face administrative and criminal charges for suspected anomalies in the distribution of mental and psychological examination results for applicants of Licenses to Own and Possess Firearms (LTOPF).
In a press conference on Tuesday held at Camp Crame, Quezon City, Brig. Gen. Benjamin Silo Jr. said that the five employees were police major, three non-commissioned officers, and a non-uniformed employee who would be charged with grave irregularity in the performance of duty, conduct unbecoming of a police officer and grave misconduct before the Internal Affairs Service.
The PNP-HS allegedly manipulated the results of the psychiatric and psychological examinations from August 2022 to February 2023.
“We already identified the persons responsible for these irregularities and right now we are filing admin and criminal cases against them before the Office of the Ombudsman,” said Silo.
“We recommended they should be placed on floating status and right now we already deactivated their accounts,” he added.
According to Silo, 377 applicants, who were supposed to get a failing grade, "passed" the psychiatric and psychological examinations.
“Out of the 377, [a total of] 64 had a non-appearance while the remaining 313 actually failed but their test results were manipulated. This was found through an investigation of our computer system and the help of our IT (information technology) experts. We also secured the testimonies of clients being victimized by this group,” said Silo.
The five personnel will also be charged for graft and corruption and violation of Republic Act 11032 or the Ease of Doing Business law before the Office of the Ombudsman.
Silo said that several applicants paid between PHP30,000 and PHP35,000 for the fabricated results, citing the declarations of various applicants.
The LTOPF's processing charge is merely about PHP2,180.
According to Silo, the Civil Security Group (CSG) has already suspended the applicants' licenses.
