linguistic:translation, information:highlighting, stylistic:tone
"Salvagings"

Summary executions were prevalent during the martial law era with bodies being recovered in various places and often bearing signs of torture and mutilation. Such cases were referred to as "salvaging" with the term widely believed to have originated from the Spanish word salvaje, meaning savage. Mutilated remains were often dumped on roadsides in public display in order to spread a sense of fear and to intimidate opponents from encouraging actions against the government – turning the Philippines into a theater state of terror.

Anyone could be "salvaged": communist rebels, suspects, innocent civilians and priests included. TFDP documented 1,473 "salvage" cases from 1980 to 1984 alone.

Victims included Pamantasan ng Lungsod ng Maynila student Liliosa Hilao, Archimedes Trajano and Juan Escandor. Also included in the list of summary execution victims was 16-year-old Luis Manuel "Boyet" Mijares, who was tortured brutally with his body found with burn marks, all his nails pulled and removed, 33 ice pick wounds around his body, skull bashed in, eyeballs gouged out, and genitals mutilated before being dropped from a helicopter.