THE PEOPLE OF THE PHILIPPINE ISLANDS, PLAINTIFF AND APPELLEE, VS. SANTIAGO RAMOS AND SANTIAGO JACINTO, DEFENDANTS. SANTIAGO RAMOS, APPELLANT.

Appellant Santiago Ramos and Santiago Jacinto were prosecuted in the
Court of First Instance of Bulacan for the crime of murder. After due
trial, Santiago Jacinto was acquitted, but Santiago Ramos was convicted
of the crime of homicide and sentenced to suffer twelve years and one
day of reclusion temporal, with the accessory penalties
prescribed by law, to indemnify the heirs of the deceased in the sum of
P1,000, and to pay one-half of the costs.

The crime here
involved took place at night and in an uninhabited place. It was
discovered because Faustino Ramos happened to pass by the place where
the crime was committed and saw the deceased in a dying condition.
Faustino Ramos tried to find out from the deceased who his aggressor
was, but the deceased could not utter any more words. He immediately
notified the authorities of the matter. Laying suspicion on the herein
appellant, the Constabulary authorities began searching for him the
same night, but he could be found nowhere. For this reason, guards were
posted near appellant’s house. Early in the morning of the next day
appellant came accompanied by his co-accused. On seeing the guards they
trembled. In view of this attitude, and seeing blood stains in
appellant’s undershirt, the two were arrested. An investigation
conducted by the Constabulary authorities resulted in two written
declarations, one subscribed and sworn to by the appellant, another by
his co-accused brother-in-law. The two declarations pointed to the
guilt of the appellant. A post-mortem examination of the body of the
deceased disclosed four open lacerated wounds in the back of the head
at the occipital region, and four other big wounds which fractured the
skull and caused the death.

At the trial the written
declarations were offered in evidence, after the clerk of the trial
court, before whom the defendants signed said declarations, testified
that he read said declarations to them and questioned them as to the
circumstances in which they were made. The defendants reserved their
right to object to the admission of the declarations in evidence, and
the trial court reserved its ruling thereon. The defense, through the
testimony of the defendants, attempted to prove that said confessions
were not read to them, thus contradicting the testimony of the clerk.
On the other hand, both the appellant and his co-defendant testified
that the former killed the deceased in self-defense. Both parties
rested their case without any ruling on the written declarations. In
his decision, the trial judge relied on said declarations and rejected
the theory of self-defense advanced by the defendants.

On
this appeal, two questions are raised: one relates to the admissibility
of the written declaration or confession of the appellant, while the
other to the sufficiency of the evidence to sustain conviction.

As to the first question, counsel contends that the testimony of the
clerk of court alone was insufficient to prove that the appellant’s
confession was made freely and voluntarily. No doubt the question thus
raised is predicated on former rulings of this court based on section 4
of Act No. 619, to the effect that no written confession should be
admitted in evidence without positive proof that it was made freely and
voluntarily. In United States vs. Zara (42 Phil., 308), this
court held that said section has been expressly repealed by the
Administrative Code of 1917, and that, in view of such repeal, the
burden of proof has shifted to the accused to establish that a written
confession or admission attributed to him was not voluntarily given by
him or that it was obtained by undue pressure. This decision was
followed in People vs. Singh (45 Phil., 676). Moreover, upon the authority of the latter case, in relation to United States vs.
Agatea (40 Phil., 596), the appellant’s confession must be held to have
been admitted without objection. In the Singh case, counsel for the
defendant moved that certain testimony relating to an alleged
confession be stricken from the record, on the ground that it had not
been shown affirmatively by direct evidence that the confession had
been made freely and voluntarily. The court took the motion under
advisement. Counsel for the defendant contended that the failure of the
trial court to rule on the motion, deprived the defendant of an
opportunity to rebut the evidence of the confession. This court held:
“The fact that the court, in its decision, takes the confession into
consideration must be regarded as a denial of the motion to strike it
from the record and if the defendant desired to introduce further
evidence in rebuttal, the matter should have been brought to the
attention of that court through the appropriate motion.” In the instant
case, there was no need for such a motion inasmuch as the defense had
an opportunity to rebut the confession in question. And in United
States vs. Agatea, supra, this court held that a confession offered in evidence and not objected to by the defendant is regarded as prima facie voluntary.

Of course this court has declared time and again that it would not
stand on mere technicality when human liberty is involved. Courts are
slow to accept extra judicial confessions and do so only after a most
painstaking scrutiny of their merit. The general rule is that the
admissibility of such confessions is necessarily addressed, in the
first instance, to the trial judge. Thug we come squarely to the second
question raised as to whether the evidence presented in this case is
sufficient to sustain the findings of the trial judge.

Appellant claims that he acted in self-defense. The burden of proof is
upon him to establish the acts constituting self-defense. (People vs. Pabellan, G. R. No. 39324^[1]; People vs.
Baguio, 43 Phil., 683.) In the instant case, the only evidence adduced
to support the theory of self-defense was the testimony of the
appellant and that of his co-accused brother-in-law, to the effect that
the deceased was the first to strike him with a piece of wood, which he
was unable to repel, after which a fair fight ensued between appellant
and the deceased. It is striking that appellant suffered no injury
whatever, and his claim that he suffered some contusions is not borne
out by the evidence of record. We are satisfied, after a careful review
of the record of the case, that appellant has failed to establish by a
preponderance of evidence that he acted in self-defense.

We
are not inclined to interfere with the finding of the trial court as to
the existence of mitigating circumstance No. 4 of article 13 of the
Revised Penal Code.

The judgment appealed from is, therefore, affirmed with costs against the appellant. So ordered.

Street, Malcolm, Vickers, and Butte, JJ., concur.

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^[1] 58 Phil., 964.