THE PEOPLE OF THE PHILIPPINES, PLAINTIFF AND APPELLEE, VS. VENERANDO VIERNES ET AL., DEFENDANTS, DANIEL ARTATES, DEFENDANT AND APPELLANT.

This appeal, from a judgment of conviction for robbery with
homicide, raises the sole question of identity.

There were six defendants. Two were discharged for lack of
sufficient evidence after the prosecution rested, and two others were acquitted
for the same reason after both parties submitted the case.

Hermogenes Cabuang and Daniel Artates, the remaining accused,
were pronounced guilty of the crime of robbery with double homicide, and
sentenced to reclusion perpetua. with the accessories of the law; to pay,
jointly and severally, the sum of P500 to Serapio de la Cruz; to return the two
wrist watches or pay their value, P300, jointly and severally, to the heirs of
Francisco Natividad; to indemnify the said heirs and those of Evangelina
Natividad, also jointly and severally, in the sum of P4,000, and each to pay his
proportionate share of the costs. From this sentence only Daniel Artates
appealed.

The conviction of the appellant;rests on the testimony of two
eyewitnesses, Leonora de la Cruz and Feliciana Arellano, and on his sworn
confession.

It appears that at about 8 o’clock on the evening of September
21, 1946, two armed men broke into the house of Serapio de la Cruz in barrio
Pongonsile, municipality of Aguilar, province of Pangasinan, forcing their way
through the back door. Before the two robbers rammed the door, a volley of shots
was fired into the house killing a nineyear old daughter of Leonora de la Cruz
and wounding the latter in the left arm and the right elbow.

Inside the house, one of the two robbers kicked Serapio de la
Cruz, Francisco Natividad (Leonora’s husband), and Feliciana Arellano, and then
shot and fatally wounded Francisco Natividad with a pistol. Afterward he
demanded money from Serapio de la Cruz and got P500. He also searched the house
with a flashlight and grabbed two wrist watches, worth P150, which he saw
hanging on the wall. Both watches belonged to Francisco Natividad.

While all this was going on, the other robber in the house was
seated on an army cot nursing a wound. He carried a rifle. An undetermined
number stayed downstairs.

At the trial, the two eyewitnesses pointed to Hermogenes
Cabuang as the man carrying a rifle and seated on a cot. The other man, who,
they said, shot down Francisco Natividad, received P500 from Serapio de la Cruz,
and picked the two watches from the wall was Daniel Artates.

Very little or no weight can be given to these witnesses’
identification of Daniel Artates. In an affidavit (Exhibit 1 and 1-A) subscribed
and sworn to by Leonora de la Cruz soon after the crime, this woman declared
that she recognized only one of the malefactors. She further stated that she
recognized that person because she had often seen him in the public market in
Mangatarem, Pangasinan. She had not seen the other before. (According to the two
witnesses, the man whom they had frequently seen in the public market was
Cabuang, and it was Cabuang, they said, who was seated on a cot and had a
rifle.) Now, Leonora de la Cruz also admitted that before the trial of this case
she was summoned to the office of the provincial fiscal for the purpose of
pointing out the two men she had seen in the house, and it appears that out of
four accused who were made to stand up in front of her she identified Hermogenes
Cabuang only. Daniel Artates, who was one of those four prisoners, she did not
pick out.

Feliciana Arellano, the other witness, admitted that on
September 23, she made and signed a statement (Exhibit “2” Cabuang-Artates)
before the municipal mayor, and that she said “No, sir” when she was asked, “Do
you recognize the robbers who went to the house that night?” And in answer to
the question of the provincial fiscal on redirect examination, “To whom did you
refer, out of these six accused, as the man holding the caliber .45 pistol,
‘about 5 feet tall, about 48 kilos and about 30 years old, who wore a fatigue
shirt terno rolled until the knee?’ “, she pointed to Daniel Artates. But to the
fiscal’s next question asking her which of the six defendants “sat on the cot
with a rifle, is about 5 feet and 3 inches tall wearing a fatigue terno?”
(Cabuang’s description) she indicated Daniel Artates again.

It is manifest from this confusion and from the contradictions
between the witnesses’ testimony at the trial and their previous statements,
that Leonora de la Cruz and Feliciana Arellano were uncertain about the identity
of Cabuang’s companion who came inside the house with him. As a matter of fact,
Daniel Artates said in his extra-judicial statement, which was introduced in
evidence by the prosecution, that it was Hermogenes Cabuang and Paran who
entered the house.

However, we are satisfied that appellant’s confession was
voluntary. Apropos of this confession, the trial court observed that “prior to
the trial of the case in the Court of First Instance, both accused, Cabuang and
Artates, appeared in the preliminary investigation before the Justice of the
Peace of Mangatarem, Pangasinan, and they did not then complain to the judge or
any other civil official that they had been subjected to ill-treatment, or that
they had been intimidated;” that they did not show “to the judicial official the
traces of maltreatment that they received;” “that both Artates and Cabuang
remained silent and made revelation for the first time of the supposed
maltreatment only during the trial in the Court of First Instance, knowing
pretty well the importance of this confession.” The court concluded that “the
repudiation by the accused of their affidavits or confessions is an afterthought
born of their eleventh hour attempt to escape responsibility.”

The record does not disclose any circumstance of weight which
would justify us in reversing the above findings. One important point which the
court below may have overlooked strengthens rather than weakens its conclusions.
It is the fact that the appellant expressly ratified the truth of his confession
to the Justice of the peace of Lingayen who took his oath.

Judged by its contents, we do not believe the confession was
framed by the military police out of their own mind. The narration is lengthy
and rich in details which only the appellant could very well have supplied,
while the military police had no reason or necessity to invent them.
Furthermore, the confession contains matters calculated to exonerate the
declarant or mitigate his responsibility. For example, it named Hermogenes
Cabuang and Paran as the two men who broke into the house, and it said that the
declarant had been forced to join the band. The first assertion is in direct
contradiction to the prosecution’s theory that it was Artates who killed
Natividad, carried away Natividad’s watches, and was handed the cash. A
confession fabricated by the police would have been patterned after the main
features of the eyewitnesses’ testimony—to bolster, not weaken or destroy,
it.

The appellant’s confession constitutes sufficient evidence to
convict. The appealed judgment is therefore affirmed with costs.

Moran, C.J., Ozaeta, Paras, Feria, Bengzon, Montemayor,
and Reyes, JJ., concur.

TUASON, J.:

I certify that Mr. Justice Pablo voted to affirm the appealed
decision.