G.R. No. 1390. January 19, 1904

In this case a complaint was filed and proceedings instituted
charging the defendant with brigandage, and the court found the facts
as proved; but, considering that the acts charged in the complaint
are not sustained by the evidence, in that it was not proven that the
band of which the accused was a member was organized for the purpose
of stealing personal property, as alleged in the complaint, the
accused was acquitted without prejudice to a subsequent prosecution
upon the facts established by the evidence.

The Solicitor-General calls attention to the testimony of the
witnesses Mateo de la Cruz and Regino de la Paz. The former stated
that during the time the band remained in the village they went to
every house in search of effects, but did not succeed in taking
anything away on account of the prompt arrival of assistance. The
other testified as follows: “I know them to be men who come into
the villages and take property which does not belong to them;”
“they took the chickens that were in the huts of my village;”
thus showing the error of the court below in not finding that the
band of which the accused was a member had robbery for its object. In
our opinion the court did err in this particular.

Therefore, the facts set forth in the complaint being duly and
sufficiently proved as constituting the crime of brigandage, which is
punished by Act No. 518, according to section 1 of this law we
sentence the accused, Rafael Cervantes, to twenty years’ imprisonment
and the costs and reverse the decision appealed from by the
Government. So ordered.

Torres, Cooper, Willard, Mapa, McDonough, and Johnson,
JJ., concur.