Republic of the
PhilippinesSUPREME COURTEN BANC
THE UNITED STATES,
Plaintiff-Appellee,
G.
R.
No. 6881
October
12, 1911
-versus-
MANUEL JAVIER AND
RAYMUNDA DE LA CRUZ,
Defendants-Appellants.
D E C I S I
O N
TORRES,
J:
This is an appeal from
the sentence imposed upon the two defendants by the Hon. Simplicio del
Rosario.On
the evening of July 2, 1910, Rosario Aquino, an unmarried girl about 15
years of age, was carried away from Fort McKinley by Valentin
Nuñez
and taken, according to her, to the house of Manuel Javier and Raymunda
de la Cruz, where he succeeded in lying with her. He then left her on
the
pretext that he would go to the office of the president or the justice
of the peace so that they might be married, but as he did not return
for
more than an hour, the girl left the house, because she had learned
from
some unknown parties that women who remained therein became bad. She
boarded
a street car to return to this city, but the car was stopped by four
municipal
policemen, who told her that their sergeant wanted to talk with her.
But
instead of taking her to the town hall they conducted her to the house
of the defendants, where, upon her arrival, Brigido Francisco, one of
the
four policemen, talked with the occupants of the house, and immediately
the woman Raymunda de la Cruz invited the girl to come inside the house
and took her into one of the rooms. Said householders picked up the
petate
or mat on which they had been lying and carried it into the kitchen,
then
spread another mat in the room, and the policeman Francisco entered and
succeeded in lying with the girl twice in spite of her resistance. On
the
afternoon of the next day Rosario Aquino left said house and went to
another,
where she was later found by her guardian, patricio Espiritu, who
reported
the matter to the authorities.
Accordingly, an
Information
was presented in the Court of First Instance of Rizal by the Provincial
Fiscal charging the said Manuel Javier and Raymunda de la Cruz with
corruption
of minors. The case came to trial and the Court rendered judgment
therein
on December 26, 1910, sentencing the defendants to two years of prision
correccional, with the accessories, each to pay half of the costs.
From this judgment they appealed.
Article 444 of the
Penal Code prescribes:
"Whosoever shall
habitually,
or, taking advantage of his authority or of another's trust, promote or
facilitate the prostitution or corruption of minors to satisfy the
lusts
of another, shall be punished with the penalty of prision correccional
in its minimum and medium degrees, and temporary absolute
disqualification
if he were an authority."
From
the foregoing Article,
it appears that the practice or repetition of the acts of promoting or
facilitating prostitution is the first and most general condition
required
by the penal law to establish the commission of the crime provided for
and penalized in said Article.
So the execution of
a single act of facilitating the prostitution of a minor, by placing
her
at another's disposal for immoral purposes, does not legally constitute
the said crime, unless it was done with abuse of authority or abuse of
trust on the part of the person who promotes or facilitates the
commission
of such immoral act, in which two cases the execution of a single act
is
alone sufficient to make its perpetrator liable under said article.
It is impossible to
determine exactly, from the conflicting and, at times, contradictory
statements
of the offended party, Rosario Aquino, whether the house to which she
was
conducted by Valentin Nuñez on that night of the second of July
and which she later left, is the same as that to which she was again
conducted
by Brigido Francisco, who slept with her therein; in order to establish
the guilt of the defendants as corruptors it is indisensable that
complete
proof appear in the case, not only of the presence and stay of said
girl
in the defendants' house for immoral purposes but also of similar acts
repeated in said house in such a manner that it may be affirmed that
the
alleged perpetrators made a practice of such repulsive crime. The case
affords no evidence that such conduct wash habitual with the
defendants,
for an immoral act committed in their house and with their consent by a
third person does not constitute habit or repetition of such acts on
their
part.
Neither does the case
reveal that there was, on the part of said defendants, any abuse of
authority,
or any abuse of trust that the girl or her guardian might have reposed
in them, for it does not appear that the offended girl and the
defendants
had been previously acquainted. Had there been abuse of trust, one
single
act executed to facilitate the prostitution or corruption of said minor
would have been sufficient to establish the existence of the crime and
the guilt of the defendants, according to the principle laid down by
the
supreme court of Spain in connection with Article 459 of the Penal Code
of that country, which is identical with Article 444 of the Code in
force
in these Islands, in its judgment of May 8, 1888.
For these reasons,
and as the facts in the case at bar do not constitute a crime, We
believe
that the judgment should be reversed and Manuel Javier and Raymunda de
la Cruz acquitted, with the costs in both instances de oficio.
So
ordered.
Mapa, Johnson, Carson
and Moreland JJ., concur. |