THE PEOPLE OF THE PHILIPPINES,PLAINTIFF AND APPELLEE, VS. ALFONSO ABALOS ET AL., DEFENDANTS.

The prosecution proved that at about 11
o’clock in the evening of January 7, 1949, an armed band raided the
house of Pedro Salcedo in barrio Ma-ambal, Pozorrubio, Pangasinan.
With three of the raiders remaining downstairs to guard, the others,
who were identified at the trial as the defendants above named, went up
the house, warned the inmates not to move and ordered that a lamp
be-lighted. Obeying the command, Carlos del Campo, the husband of Pedro
Salcedo’s daughter, Carmen Salcedo, lit a lamp and placed it in the
middle of the house, a four-meter square affair without any partitions.
The raiders then bound Pedro Salcedo and Carlos del Campo and tied them
to a bed at the foot of the stairs. To subdue Carlos del Campo they
also struck him in the abdomen with the butt of a gun. Turning their
attention next to Carmen Salcedo, they asked her “to produce the
money,” and when she refused she was slapped and threatened with a
dagger. Seized with fear, she called to her father to give them “the
money,” whereupon one of the raiders searched the body of Pedro Salcedo
and took the P337.00 which he found in his wallet.

Not satisfied with this loot, Alfonso Abalos, who had
apparently taken a fancy to Carmen Salcedo, dragged her to the bushes
and raped her, as did also Irineo Ramos and three others who had
followed them there. Thereafter the marauders ransacked the house and
made away with 11 chickens, 60 eggs, a pair of earrings, a carbide lamp
and a ring, all valued at P87.50. But before leaving they tied Pedro
Salcedo and Carlos del Campo to the nearby bushes, and there the two
remained until a younger son of Pedro Salcedo came to untie them that
same night.

The next morning Pedro Salcedo and Carlos del Campo went to town and reported the matter to the police, and with one
of them to guide the agents of the law; the four defendants above named
were arrested in their respective houses that same day. The other
malefactors were not found.

After his arrest, the defendant Irineo Ramos signed a statement,
which he later ratified under oath before the justice of the peace, to
the effect that at about 10 o’clock on the night in question Alfonso
Abalos, Sixto Godoy and others went to see him and “convinced” him to
go with them to the house of Pedro Salcedo and Carlos del Campo “to rob
the money paid to them * * * (for) their cow;” that he went along with
them because he was threatened with death; and that he himself did not
go up the house but stayed about ten meters away while his companions
were perpetrating robbery and rape.

Denying participation in the crime charged, Irineo Ramos and
Edilberto Ramos claimed that from the afternoon of January 6 to the
afternoon of January 8, 1949, they were in Alipangpang, another
barrio of Pozorrubio, milling the sugar cane of one German Salgado;
while on their part, Alfonso Abalos and Benedicto Godoy testified that
from the morning of January 7 until the afternoon of the next day they
were in barrio Amagbagan, harvesting the rice of Amelia Cabreros.

The trial court did not give credence to defendants’ alibi, found them guilty as charged and sentenced them to reclusion perpetua
with the accessories of the law, jointly and severally to indemnify
Carmen Salcedo in the sum of P5,000, to return the sum of P337.00 and
the other things taken by them or pay their value to Pedro Salcedo, and
to pay proportionate costs. From this sentence defendant’s have
appealed.

After going over the evidence we entertain no doubt as to
appellants’ guilt. For they were clearly and positively identified by
their victims, while the alibi they put up is not believable.
The contradictions noted in the declarations of some of the witnesses
for the prosecution are not important enough to affect their
credibility. On the whole, they gave a consistent and convincing
narration.

It is true that, according to the witnesses Pedro Salcedo, Carlos
del Campo, and Carmen Salcedo, appellants had their faces partly
covered with the brims of their hats— in an attempt no doubt to conceal
their identity. But there being light inside the house and a bright
moon outside, appellants could not with such a crude device have
prevented recognition, for-it appears that they had long been known to
the inmates of the house, one of them—Alfonso Abalos—having been even a
classmate of Carlos del Campo, And it also appears that this Alfonso
Abalos, accompanied by Sixto Godoy, had been to that house just the day
before to buy Carlos del Campo’s cow, paying P320 for it, and that
Edilberto Ramos had also been there that day to redeem a carabao which
had strayed into Pedro Salcedofs property. In addition to all this, we
have the sworn statement of Irineo Ramos in which he admits having
joined the raiders at the instigation of Alfonso Abalos, Sixto Godoy,
and others. The claim that this statement was not voluntary would seem
to be precluded by the fact that it contains an exculpation and is
belied by the testimony of the police officer who wrote it down and of
the justice of the peace before whom it was sworn

The purchase of Del Campo’s cow by Abalos acquires added
significance when considered with the evidence that P320 of the money
found by the robbers in Pedro Salcedo’s wallet was precisely the price
paid by Abalos for said cow, and as proof that they were after this
particular sun of money one of them asked, as he got hold of the
wallet, if the amount was still intact, while Irineo Ramos says in his
sworn statement that when Alfonso Abalos, Sixto Godoy and the others
picked him up that night they told him that they were going to the
house of the Salcedos to rob the money paid to them for the cow.

Calling attention to the entry in the police blotter with reference
to the raid, the defense lays stress on the last sentence thereof,
which says that one of the robbers was identified “as Berto Ramos, a
resident of Naglanggalang.” From this the inference is drawn that the
other robbers were not identified. But aside from the fact that the
trial court has found this part of the entry to be a spurious insertion
or a “falsification,” we have the assurance of Carlos del Campo that in
reporting the robbery to the police in the morning of January 8, he and
his father-in-law did give the names of the four appellants, as
name them they also did in the investigation conducted in the afternoon
of that day. And there can be no doubt that Del Campo, at least, knew
who the raiders were, for it was he who guided the policemen who
arrested them in their respective houses in the evening of that same
day.

The defense also makes a point of the fact that the rape of Carmen
Salcedo was not mentioned by either her father or her husband in their
report to the police the morning following the robbery. But as to the
father, the evidence shows that at that time he had not.yet been
informed of what the malefactors did to his daughter in the bushes. And
as to the husband, his reticence on such matters may simply have been
due to a natural disinclination to divulge information detrimental to
his honor until urged to do so. In any event, we do not think Carmen
Salcedo would have exposed herself to shame with a story such as that
she recounted in court if she had not really been ravished by the malefactors.

The lower court has failed to include the ring and a pair of
earrings (or their value—P39) among the articles to be returned to
Pedro Salcedo. But, except for this omission,we find the judgment below
to be substantially correct. Wherefore, understood modified to the
extent of supplying the omission, the said judgment is hereby affirmed
with costs.

Paras, C. J., Feria, Pablo, Bengzon, Padilla, Tuason and Jugo, JJ., concur.
Montemayor, Bautista Angelo, JJ., no part.