FACT CHECK: No official police mugshot of VP Sara; photos are AI-generated - Rappler
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Claim: A post shows Vice President Sara Duterte’s police mugshot after she was ordered arrested over her grave threats case.
Why we fact-checked this: A Facebook post published on September 5 shows the image with the caption, “Another record for Sara — ang kauna-unahang VP na naisyuhan ng WOA habang nasa pwesto. Worst VP ever talaga.”
(Another record for Sara — the first VP to be issued a warrant of arrest while still in office. Really the worst VP ever.)
The photo shows Duterte wearing a yellow shirt and holding a booking sign, which reads “Sara Zimmerman Duterte, Case No. 2025-04156, Grave Threat, Violation of Article 282, Revised Penal Code.”
While most of the comments suspected that the photo was edited, some commenters believed it was real due to the arrest warrant against Duterte.
As of writing, the post has drawn over 2,800 reactions, 1,200 comments, and 131 shares. Similar other posts purportedly showing Duterte’s mugshot are circulating online.
The facts: The image is not an official police mugshot. No such mugshots exist following Duterte’s posting of bail on September 5.
The photo has been flagged by AI-detection tool TruthScan, showing a 28% probability of AI generation and classifying it as “Digitally Edited.” A similar analysis by Sightengine found the photo to be 68% likely to contain deepfake content.
While the Quezon City Regional Trial Court did issue an arrest warrant against Duterte on September 4 over three counts of grave threats, she was not physically arrested by the police. She appeared before the court voluntarily the following day and posted bail.
Duterte’s voluntary surrender before the court also meant that while she still underwent standard court booking procedures such as fingerprinting, she was spared from having her mugshot taken. (READ: Why was Sara Duterte allowed to post bail on a Saturday? No mugshot taken?)
Her lawyer, Paul Lawrence Lim, said Duterte submitted the required photos herself in lieu of mugshots, adding that mugshots are taken by the police in the case of an arrest. These photos have not been made public as of writing.
A 2022 court circular also allows an accused to submit four sets of his or her photo “on all copies of the corresponding bail bond to be issued or posted.”
Bicol-Saro Partylist Representative Terry Ridon later called out the absence of a mugshot during Duterte’s posting of bail as “special treatment,” drawing a comparison with Senator Rodante Marcoleta’s surrender to the Sandiganbayan, where the mandatory booking procedures were followed.
“It is clearly a case of special treatment that does not speak well of the rule of law and the equality of persons before the law,” he said.
Duterte’s case: The arrest warrant stemmed from three counts of grave threats over Duterte’s November 2024 remarks that she allegedly instructed someone to kill President Ferdinand Marcos Jr., First Lady Liza Araneta-Marcos and then-House speaker Martin Romualdez if she were killed. The Quezon City court found probable cause to hold her for trial and set bail at P120,000 per count, or P360,000 in total.
When she appeared at the courthouse to post bail, Duterte said she did not feel safe, citing what she described as documented threats and harassment since 2023. She said she feared for her children and told reporters, “I do not feel safe. Pakiramdam ko papatayin nila ako.”
(I do not feel safe. I feel like they will kill me.)
The grave threats allegation also makes up one of the four articles in her ongoing impeachment trial. – Cyril Bocar/Rappler.com
Efren Cyril Bocar is a journalist from Llorente, Eastern Samar who graduated with a degree in English Language Studies at the Visayas State University. Cyril is also a graduate of the Aries Rufo Journalism Fellowship of Rappler for 2024.
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