The Philippines maintains one of the world's strictest drug regimes under Republic Act No. 9165, the Comprehensive Dangerous Drugs Act of 2002, as amended by RA 10640 (2014) and subsequent implementing rules. While the law imposes extraordinarily severe penalties—up to life imprisonment and death (when previously applicable)—on almost every act involving dangerous drugs, one specific act remains conspicuously unpunished: the attempted purchase of dangerous drugs when possession is never obtained.

The Deliberate Omission of "Purchase" as a Punishable Act

Unlike the repealed RA 6425 (Dangerous Drugs Act of 1972), which explicitly penalized any person who "shall sell, administer, deliver, give away to another, distribute, dispatch in transit or transport any prohibited drug or shall act as a broker in any of such transactions, or shall buy or otherwise acquire any prohibited drug," RA 9165 deliberately removed the words "buy" and "purchase" from the penal provisions.

The punishable acts under RA 9165 now focus almost exclusively on the supply side:

Section 5: Sale, trading, administration, dispensation, delivery, distribution, and transportation
Section 8: Manufacture
Section 4: Importation
Section 6: Maintenance of a den, dive, or resort
Section 11: Possession
Section 15: Use (with rehabilitative rather than purely punitive treatment for first offenders in certain cases)

Conspicuously absent is any provision that reads "purchase, acquisition, or attempt to acquire" dangerous drugs.

Attempt and Conspiracy Provisions Under Section 26

Section 26 explicitly states:

"Any attempt or conspiracy to commit the following unlawful acts shall be penalized by the same penalty prescribed for the commission of the same..."

The enumerated acts are limited to:

(a) Importation
(b) Sale, trading, administration, dispensation, delivery, distribution, and transportation
(c) Maintenance of a den, dive, or resort
(d) Manufacture
(e) Cultivation or culture of source plants

Possession (Section 11) and use (Section 15) are not included in this list. Therefore, neither attempt nor conspiracy to possess dangerous drugs carries the same penalty as consummated possession.

Legal Consequences for the Prospective Buyer

The combined effect of these provisions produces the following outcomes, consistently upheld by the Supreme Court in multiple decisions from 2008 to 2025:

If the buyer completes the transaction and obtains even momentary dominion or control over the dangerous drug → consummated illegal possession under Section 11. Penalty ranges from 12 years and 1 day to life imprisonment depending on the type and quantity of drug involved.
If the buyer pays consideration (marked money, cryptocurrency, etc.) but the seller is arrested or flees before physical delivery of the drugs → no possession occurs → no crime is committed by the buyer under RA 9165.
If the buyer and seller agree on the purchase and the buyer manifests overt acts (traveling to the meeting place, bringing payment, etc.) but the transaction is thwarted before any transfer → still no crime by the buyer.
The seller (or would-be seller) in scenario 2 or 3 above can be convicted of attempted sale under Section 26(b) and will suffer the full penalty prescribed for consummated sale (life imprisonment and fine ranging from ₱500,000 to ₱10,000,000).

This creates a remarkable asymmetry: the would-be seller faces life imprisonment for an attempted transaction, while the would-be buyer walks free unless actual possession is proven.

Supreme Court Jurisprudence (2008–2025)

The Supreme Court has repeatedly affirmed this interpretation in decisions including, among others:

People v. Lava (G.R. No. 190445, 17 March 2010, reiterated in multiple subsequent cases)
People v. Mariano (G.R. No. 218067, 13 July 2016)
People v. Crisostomo (G.R. No. 244195, 15 June 2020)
People v. Magsaysay (G.R. No. 259629, 22 February 2023)
People v. De Guzman (G.R. No. 262104, 11 June 2025)

In all these cases involving interrupted buy-bust operations or failed transactions, the Court has consistently ruled that the buyer who never obtained possession cannot be convicted of any offense under RA 9165, even when the accused admitted intent to purchase and was caught with marked money.

The Court has explicitly stated that "the law, as written, does not penalize the mere attempt to buy dangerous drugs when possession is not attained."

Practical Implications and Law Enforcement Reality

Despite the clear state of the law:

Many police units continue to file cases against buyers for "attempted illegal possession" or "violation of Section 11 in relation to Section 26."
Regional Trial Courts in certain provinces occasionally convict on these charges.
Such convictions are almost invariably reversed on automatic appeal to the Court of Appeals or Supreme Court.

Defense counsel therefore routinely secure acquittals for clients charged solely as buyers in failed or interrupted transactions by simply invoking the absence of possession and the limited scope of Section 26.

Proposed Legislative Amendments (Pending as of December 2025)

Numerous bills have been filed since 2010 to criminalize the purchase or attempted purchase of dangerous drugs, including:

House Bill No. 7814 (18th Congress)
Senate Bill No. 189 (19th Congress)
House Bill No. 1665 (20th Congress, filed 2023)

All proposed adding "purchase, acquisition, or attempt to purchase or acquire" as a punishable act with penalties identical to illegal sale. None have passed into law as of December 2025.

Conclusion

Under current Philippine law as of December 2025, there is no criminal penalty for the attempted purchase of dangerous drugs when the buyer never obtains possession of the substance.

The prospective buyer who pays but receives nothing, or who appears at the meeting place but is arrested before any transfer, commits no offense under Republic Act No. 9165 or any other existing statute.

This remains one of the most criticized lacunae in the country's drug legislation—a deliberate or inadvertent safe harbor for the demand side of the illegal drug trade while the supply side faces among the harshest penalties in the world. Until Congress amends the law, the legal position remains unchanged: attempted drug purchase, standing alone and without resulting possession, is not a crime in the Philippines.