G.R. No. L-10219. August 29, 1957

In  an  information dated  October 1, 1954  Benjamin Gomez  y Sanga,  Alejandro Ramos  y Cailao,  Komualdo Lobrio y Miranda, Ricardo de Jesus y Gatos alias Carding Aguila, and Dominador Senio y Gaviola were charged with the crime of  robbery with homicide committed at No.  1198 La Torre St.,  Manila, on  September 29, 1954,  on which occasion the  owner of the  house, Pablo Lim, was stabbed with a kitchen knife and killed.  The first  four were all arrested and  when the information was read to them,  they all pleaded not guilty.  Before the  trial  Komualdo  Lobrio y  Miranda withdrew his plea and entered a  plea of  guilty, so the case continued as to the other three  accused.  But after two of the most important witnesses for the prosecution had testified, Benjamin Gomez y Sanga  and Alejandro Ramos y  Cailao also withdrew  their former plea  of not guilty and substituted it with  that of guilty.  So the  case continued with respect to the last two of the accused, namely Ricardo de Jesus y Gatos alias Carding Aguila and Dominador Senio  alias Adol.   After  conclusion of  the trial the court acquitted Dominador Senio  alias  Adol but  found Ricardo  de Jesus  guilty and  sentenced  him accordingly. All the three accused  who  had  pleaded  guilty were  also sentenced.

Ricardo de Jesus y Gatos appealed from the judgment to the Court of Appeals, which  certified the case to US on the ground that the  judgment appealed from imposes the penalty of reclusion  perpetua upon four of the accused.

It is not disputed, and the evidence for the prosecution satisfactorily shows, that after midnight (about 1 o’clock) of September 23,  1954, while the spouses Pablo Lim and Virginia Flores and their children were  sleeping soundly in their house at 1198 La Torre street, Tondo, Manila, the wife was suddenly awakened as she noticed someone walking above  the head of her husband.  She immediately shouted to her husband, ‘Tabling, Pabling, mayroon magnanakaw.” Thereupon, she went to the kitchen to inform her mother- in-law of the presence of a thief in  the house.  Her son Donilo Lim, 9 years old,  was also awakened by the noise of a person  walking in the room.   He saw this  person taking a radio, some clothes and  a clock, which he carried to a window and which he handed to another at that place. Both the mother and Danilo  Lim testified that the person who was inside the room was the accused Alejandro Ramos. But the boy  also  declared that he  recognized  the person who stabbed  his father near the window and that it was Romualdo Lobrio.

The evidence submitted by the prosecution  to connect the appellant Ricardo  de  Jesus y Gatos with the crime is his confession, Exhibit “A”  which he  signed  before the police on September 80, 1954. According to the detectives who testified for the prosecution the appellant signed this freely  and voluntarily.  But the appellant  claims that it was not made voluntarily, alleging  that he was forced  to sign it because he had been  manhandled  and was  beaten badly by the police, and that he had to sign it because  of the beating that  he received  and  the pains he  felt by reason of the beating.  The  appellant sought  to corroborate his claim, that the confession was obtained by him through force and  violence, by the testimonies of the other accused, namely, Alejandro Ramos, Benjamin Gomez and Romualdo Lobrio.  The appellant also submitted evidence to the  effect that  in the evening’ of  September 29, he was in a party in which  drinking was indulged in;  that  at about 10 o’clock that night he was brought to  his house drunk; that he went to sleep immediately and was in bed until  about 4 o’clock the next morning.  This testimony of his was corroborated by that of his father and Francisco del Mundo  and Delfin Reyes.  In spite of this  formidable array of  witnesses declaring1 in favor of the appellant, the trial court refused to  believe the  claim  of the appellant.

We have taken pains to scrutinize with care the confession signed by  the appellant and  we find that  it  could not have been the voluntary confession of the appellant,  as the prosecution  claims and as the court a quo found  it, but that  it  must have been  prepared under the direction  of the accused Romualdo Lobrio and put to writing under the latter’s  direction, and that the appellant was compelled to sign it  later as his own confession.   Thus Alejandro Ramos testified that the  statements! were given to the detectives  by Lobrio and Gomez, and  not by Ricardo  de Jesus (t.s.n.,  pp.  41-42,  hearing on  January 4, 1955). Benjamin Gomez declared that the  appellant did not want to give a statement but that Alejandro Samoa  maltreated him as  also did the detectives  (t.s.n., pp. 35-36, idem.) Romualdo Lobrio declared that appellant was forced to sign the confession1 and that he, Lobrio, was  one of those who gave  him fist blows to compel him to sign the statement (t.s.n., p. 8, hearing on January 11, 1955).

The confession contains  the statement that  the person who was inside the house and who stabbed Pablo Lim was Adol  (Bominador Senio y Gaviola), and that Adol took the stolen things  inside the  room of the house and delivered them to Ricardo de Jesus,  who in turn handed the things stolen to Romualdo Lobrio, who was downstairs.  The  statements conflict with the evidence submitted by the prosecution, according to which it was Alejandro Ramos who was inside the  room; that  Alejandro Ramos  delivered the articles stolen to  Romualdo  Lobrio near the window, and that it was Romualdo Lobrio who stabbed the owner  of the house.   The same  statements are contained in the affidavit of Benjamin Gomez  and Romualdo Lobrio (Exhibits “1”, “i”  and “j”),  namely, that it was Dominador Senio and Ricardo de Jesus who were inside the house and  that Alejandro Ramos and Romualdo Lobrio and  Gomez  who were  down below. The parallelism between the three affidavits or confessions signed  by Alejandro Ramos,  Romualdo Lobrio and  Ricardo de Jesus to the effect that the appellant and Dominador Senio were inside the house while the other three  accused, Lobrio, Gomez and Ramos were down below, leads  to the conclusion  that the confessions were  actually the  statements  given for the  appellant by the three accused  who  pleaded guilty,  namely,  Lobrio, Ramos and Gomez.   These confessions were made  on  September 30,  before  trial  and before  they pleaded  guilty. Evidently, at that time, they wanted to shift the blame to De Jesus, the appellant, and to Senio. But when the  trial started and  proceeded, and the witnesses  for the prosecution testified and  pointed  out  Lobrio and Ramos  as the ones who were inside the house and stabbed the deceased owner, they had no other recourse but to  admit their guilt, and impelled  by their conscience they later admitted that  it  was they  who  had committed the offense,   and they  also testified  in  favor of the appellant Ricardo de Jesus.

We are fully satisfied  after  a consideration of the facts and circumstances,  especially  above set  forth, that the confession Exhibit “H”,  although signed  by  appellant Ricardo  de Jesus, does not represent a voluntary acknowledgment by him of his  participation  in the crime, but a statement of his co-accused imputing to  him the  offense and  relieving  themselves  (the accused)  of  the  responsibility for the act which they themselves had committed. Under these circumstances we must declare that the charge against  the appellant has not been proved beyond reasonable  doubt as the law requires, and we must declare him innocent of the charge  and absolve  him therefrom.

The judgment appealed from, declaring appellant guilty, is hereby reversed  and the appellant acquitted, with  costs de oficio in both instances.

Paras, C. J., Bengzon, Padilla,, Montemayor, Reyes,  A., Bautista Angelo, Concepcion,  Reyes,  J. B.  L., Endencia, and Felix, JJ., concur.