EN
BANC
THE
PEOPLE OF THE
PHILIPPINES,
Plaintiff-Appellee,
G.
R.
No. L-19143
November
29, 1968
-versus-
SANTOS
RAMOS, PEDRO
ALEMANIA,
LUCILO
ESMA AND
ALFONSO ESMA,
Defendants-Appellants.
D
E C I S I
O N
DIZON,
J :
Appeal from a Decision
of the Court of First Instance of Surigao the dispositive portion of
which
is as follows:
"WHEREFORE, the Court
hereby finds the accused, SANTOS RAMOS, LUCILO ESMA, PEDRO ALEMANIA and
ALFONSO ESMA, guilty, beyond reasonable doubt, of the crime of Murder,
defined and penalized under Article 248 of the Revised Penal Code, with
the accused Santos Ramos as principal, and the accused Lucilo Esma,
Pedro
Alemania and Alfonso Esma as accomplices, and there being no mitigating
nor aggravating circumstances to consider for or against said accused,
and applying the provisions of the Indeterminate Sentence Law as
regards
the accomplices, imposes upon the accused Santos Ramos the penalty of reclusion
perpetua and upon Lucilo Esma, Pedro Alemania and Alfonso Esma, the
penalty of not less than ten [10] years of prision mayor as
minimum;
to not more than seventeen [17] years and four [4] months of reclusion
temporal; both with the accessory penalties provided by law; to
indemnify
jointly and severally the heirs of the victim in the sum of P6,000.00;
plus the costs. All the accused are to be credited with onehalf of the
detention period."
The evidence shows that
appellant Alfonso Esma was a resident of Barrio Magpayang, Mainit,
Surigao
del Norte, where he owned and operated a restaurant. Living with him in
the house where such business was conducted were his cousin, appellant
Lucilo Esma, and their co-appellants Santos Ramos and Pedro Alemania,
the
three being Alfonso's helpers.
Early in the evening
of January 24, 1960, a man known as Feling entered the restaurant in a
drunken condition. Probably to avoid untoward incidents in his eating
place,
Alfonso pushed him outside with such violence that Feling fell to the
ground.
It was soon thereafter that Agapito Montaner, Jr. also entered the
restaurant.
Thinking probably that the new arrival was the same person ousted
sometime
before or that he was also in a drunken condition, Lucilo Esma
approached
him and put his right arm over his left shoulder. Apparently Agapito
did
not like this for he tried to free himself, but while Lucilo still had
his right arm over Agapito's shoulder, appellant Santos Ramos
approached
him from behind and thrust a double- bladed dagger into the left side
of
his body. Immediately thereafter, appellant Pedro Alemania also
attacked
Agapito with fist blows on the face, while Alfonso Esma pushed him
toward
outside the restaurant, this also causing the victim to fall on the
pavement
face upward and shouting for help.
Agapito was then taken
by some passersby to the house of the Barrio Lieutenant and later to a
hospital where he died fifteen minutes after arrival due to hemorrhage
as a result of the wound inflicted upon him. He also showed a contusion
on the left lower jaw [Exhibits A and B, Medical Certificate and
Certificate
of Death, respectively].
As against the
foregoing,
the defense version of the incident runs as follows:
That on the evening
in question a drunkard known as Feling entered Alfonso Esma's
restaurant
asking the people therein: "Who is tough here?"; that Pedro Alemania
answered
him saying that nobody in the place was tough, but that he should get
out
because he was drunk, at the same time giving him a violent push which
caused him to stumble; that Alfonso Esma then appeared and also told
Feling
to go home; that Lucilo Esma then came and he led Feling outside; that
at that juncture Agapito Montañer, Jr. arrived also asking "Who
is tough here among you?" and as nobody answered, he hit Santos Ramos
on
the stomach and attempted to pick up a big stone; that as he was in the
act of picking up the stone, Santos Ramos stabbed him on the left side
of the body.
Even in accordance
with the defense version, therefore, it is a fact that Santos Ramos
stabbed
the deceased Agapito Montañer, Jr. on the left side of the body
- the wound thus inflicted having caused his death soon thereafter.
The other aspects of
the story given by appellants and their witnesses, however, can not
stand
against, much less overcome the findings made by the judge a quo who,
after
a careful consideration of the evidence of record, stated them briefly
as follows:
"It has been proven
to the full satisfaction of the Court that in the fatal day in question
Agapito Montañer, Jr., suspected to be drunk, was held around
the
neck by the accused Lucilo Esma and as he was struggling to extricate
himself,
he was given a blow from behind with a dagger by the accused Santos
Ramos
hitting the deceased on the left side piercing his lung and causing his
death less than an hour later. After he had been wounded, the accused
Pedro
Alemania gave the victim a fistic blow on his face. And, as if not
satisfied
with the injury that had already been inflicted on the deceased, the
owner
of the restaurant, the accused Alfonso Esma, pushed Montañer,
Jr.
out of the restaurant and Agapito Montañer, Jr. fell on his back
to the ground."
The
first and third assignments
of error made in appellants' brief deal exclusively with the alleged
insufficiency
of the prosecution evidence and of the evidence as a whole to support
the
above findings and the judgment of conviction. After a careful
consideration
of the evidence of record We find no justification at all to reverse
nor
even modify both or either.
Another question raised
by appellants in their brief is that Santos Ramos, if at all, should
have
been convicted of homicide only. This is also untenable in the light of
the evidence clearly showing that he stabbed Agapito Montañer,
Jr.
from behind and while the latter was, to a certain degree, helpless
because
Lucilo Esma had his right arm over his left shoulder. Thus, it is clear
that he was attacked treacherously.
WHEREFORE, the appealed
Decision being in accordance with law and the evidence, the same is
hereby
affirmed, with costs except as to the indemnity, which is hereby
increased
to P12,000.00.
Concepcion, C.J.,
Reyes, J.B.L., Makalintal, Zaldivar, Sanchez, Ruiz Castro, Fernando and
Capistrano, JJ., concur. |