Three rifles registered to Vice President Sara Duterte fall under a class of automatic-capable firearms that Philippine law generally limits to the police and military, a Philippine National Police officer told the Senate impeachment court on Monday, September 28, 2026.
Police Major Joericson Sangalang of the PNP Firearms and Explosives Office took the stand as a House prosecution witness under Article II of the impeachment articles, which accuses Duterte of amassing unexplained wealth and leaving it out of her Statement of Assets, Liabilities, and Net Worth (SALN). Bombo Radyo reported that the hearing was the 30th day of the trial.
Records Sangalang presented put the couple’s combined arsenal at 51 guns. Duterte’s husband, lawyer Manases “Mans” Carpio, holds 29, one of them a Class A light weapon. Bombo Radyo also reported that one of Carpio’s firearms carries an expired license. The Vice President has 22 firearms registered in her name, a mix of pistols, rifles, and a shotgun.
The rifle count lines up with FEO records obtained by Rappler in a December 2024 investigation into the Duterte family’s firearms, which listed three Class A light weapons under the Vice President’s name and one under Carpio’s.
House prosecutor Rep. Ysabel Zamora said the testimony would establish that the couple “maintain a hobby in gun collecting by owning… more than 50 firearms… with a value of at least P7 million,” according to the Philippine Daily Inquirer. The prosecution’s position is that each registered weapon should have been listed as personal property in Duterte’s SALN.
That argument met resistance from several senator-judges. Sen. Erwin Tulfo asked how the guns bore on hidden wealth, earlier joking about whether they were studded with diamonds or gold. Sen. Juan Miguel Zubiri pointed out that many senators own firearms themselves.
“We just wanna make sure of the relevance of this particular evidence,” Zubiri said.
Sen. Vicente Sotto III added that he also owns guns but declares them in his own SALN.
Presiding Officer Francis Escudero questioned whether an estimated P7 million in firearms could advance a wealth case, noting that the amount sits inside Duterte’s declared net worth. “We find this witness not as convincing with respect to ill-gotten wealth as would be others,” he said. The Inquirer reported that Escudero still let the prosecution proceed, on condition that the examination be brief.
The defense sided with the skeptical senators. Lawyer Carlo Joaquin Narvasa said the defense had yet to see the list of firearms Sangalang was presenting.
“Even if we were given time to peruse any list that the good major will be presenting, we believe that this witness is irrelevant. So, we have the same reservations as the good senators,” Narvasa said.
Under Republic Act 10591, the Comprehensive Firearms and Ammunition Regulation Act, Class A light weapons cover self-loading pistols, rifles, carbines, submachine guns, assault rifles, and light machine guns up to 7.62 mm with a fully automatic mode. Sangalang testified that only law enforcement agencies may now acquire them. Private individuals who bought such weapons before the law took effect are allowed to keep them, he said, but cannot transfer them to any other gun owner.
