THE PEOPLE OF THE PHILIPPINES, PLAINTIFF-APPELLEE, VS. ALFREDO HERILA, DEFENDANT-APPELLANT.

People versus Herila

The Case

This is a criminal appeal in which the People of the Philippines prosecuted Alfredo Herila for the murder of Matias Lalaguna, a barrio captain, who was attacked on a footpath in the barrio of Mapuyo, Mobo, Masbate, on the morning of August 17, 1966. Herila was charged together with Simon Alteza, who pleaded guilty, while Herila pleaded not guilty and stood trial on a defense of alibi. The case matters to a reviewee for two reasons: it is a clean illustration of how the Supreme Court weighs positive identification against alibi, and it shows the Court correcting a trial court that wrongly credited the mitigating circumstance of lack of intent to commit so grave a wrong as that committed, with the result that the penalty was raised rather than lowered on appeal.

Procedural History

An information for murder was filed by the Provincial Fiscal of Masbate in the Court of First Instance of Masbate against Simon Alteza and Alfredo Herila. When arraigned, Alteza pleaded guilty and was sentenced, while Herila entered a plea of not guilty and the trial proceeded against him alone. The trial court found Herila guilty beyond reasonable doubt as principal by direct participation in murder qualified by treachery, appreciated in his favor the mitigating circumstance of lack of intent to commit so grave a wrong as that committed, applied the indeterminate sentence law, and imposed a prison term ranging from ten years and one day of prision mayor as minimum to seventeen years, four months and one day of reclusion temporal as maximum, with an indemnity of six thousand pesos. Herila appealed to the Court of Appeals, but that court certified the case to the Supreme Court for final determination because the imposable penalty was found to be reclusion perpetua. The appeal therefore reached the Supreme Court as an appeal certified from the Court of Appeals.

Facts

On the morning of August 17, 1966, at around six o'clock, Matias Lalaguna left his house in Mapuyo with two of his children, Nilda and Adelino, to gather firewood. His wife Benita stayed home. After walking a short distance, Nilda saw Alfredo Herila and Simon Alteza hiding beside the footpath. The two suddenly emerged, and Nilda shouted to her father to run because somebody was going to stab him. The shout drew the attention of neighbors, and the commotion caused Benita to look out from the door of her house toward the footpath.

Both Benita and Nilda saw Simon Alteza hack Matias on the head with a bolo. Matias ran toward his house but fell to the ground before reaching it. Alfredo Herila then approached the fallen man and with a bolo slashed his right elbow, inflicting a three inch wound. The assailants left, and Matias got up and reached his house, where a tourniquet was applied to his arm, but the bleeding could not be stopped. He died at around nine o'clock, three hours after the attack. The medical officer testified that the cause of death was shock secondary to external hemorrhage, that the wound at the right elbow completely severed the major arteries and veins, and that even without the head wound death would have resulted just the same.

Herila's defense was alibi. He claimed he was not in Mapuyo that morning but in Sitio Sawmill, about four kilometers away, where he had brought his wife and child to visit his father-in-law, returning to Mapuyo only at three o'clock in the afternoon, when he was arrested shortly after lying down to rest. His wife and a relative corroborated him. The defense also presented Sofronio Escoto, who said he saw Simon Alteza stab the victim but did not see Herila in the vicinity, although on cross examination he admitted that after the stabbing he ran home, closed his door and windows out of fear, and stayed inside without observing anything further.

Issues

• Whether or not the trial court erred in finding Alfredo Herila guilty of murder beyond reasonable doubt and in not acquitting him on the ground of reasonable doubt, notwithstanding his defense of alibi.
• Whether or not the trial court correctly appreciated in favor of the accused the mitigating circumstance that he had no intention to commit so grave a wrong as that committed.
• Whether or not the penalty and the civil indemnity imposed by the trial court should be modified.

Applicable Provisions

Article 248 of the Revised Penal Code, which defines and penalizes murder, provides:

Article 248. Murder. — Any person who, not falling within the provisions of Article 246 shall kill another, shall be guilty of murder and shall be punished by reclusion temporal in its maximum period to death, if committed with any of the following attendant circumstances: 1. With treachery, taking advantage of superior strength, with the aid of armed men, or employing means to weaken the defense or of means or persons to insure or afford impunity. 2. In consideration of a price, reward, or promise. 3. By means of inundation, fire, poison, explosion, shipwreck, stranding of a vessel, derailment or assault upon a street car or locomotive, fall of an airship, by means of motor vehicles, or with the use of any other means involving great waste and ruin. 4. On occasion of any of the calamities enumerated in the preceding paragraph, or of an earthquake, eruption of a volcano, destructive cyclone, epidemic or other public calamity. 5. With evident premeditation. 6. With cruelty, by deliberately and inhumanly augmenting the suffering of the victim, or outraging or scoffing at his person or corpse.

This is the provision under which Herila was convicted, and its range of penalties, from reclusion temporal in its maximum period to death, fixes the penalty that the Court must calibrate once it sets aside the mitigating circumstance.

Article 13 of the Revised Penal Code, on mitigating circumstances, provides in its relevant portion:

Article 13. Mitigating circumstances. — The following are mitigating circumstances: 1. Those mentioned in the preceding chapter, when all the requisites necessary to justify or to exempt from criminal liability in the respective cases are not attendant. 2. That the offender is under eighteen years of age or over seventy years. In the case of the minor, he shall be proceeded against in accordance with the provisions of Act Number 3203. 3. That the offender had no intention to commit so grave a wrong as that committed.

Paragraph 3 is the mitigating circumstance the trial court credited and the Supreme Court refused to sustain, because the evidence showed a deliberate intent to kill.

Article 29 of the Revised Penal Code, as amended, on preventive imprisonment, provides in its relevant portion:

Article 29. Period of preventive imprisonment deducted from term of imprisonment. — Offenders or accused who have undergone preventive imprisonment shall be credited in the service of their sentence consisting of deprivation of liberty, with the whole time during which they have been under preventive imprisonment, except in the following cases: 1. When they are recidivists or have been convicted previously twice or more times of any crime; and 2. When upon being summoned for the execution of their sentence they have failed to surrender voluntarily. If the detention prisoner does not agree to abide by the same disciplinary rules imposed upon convicted prisoners, he shall be credited in the service of his sentence with four-fifths of the time during which he has undergone preventive imprisonment.

This provision governs the credit for preventive imprisonment that the Court directed to be applied to Herila.

Ruling

On the first issue, the Court affirmed the finding of guilt. The appellant argued that Benita could not have seen the stabbing because she was inside the house, but the record showed she was at the door of her house after hearing the shout, and she explained that the place where her husband was attacked was unobstructed, with the houses, banana plants, and flowering plants on the other side. The Court held that in her fear and excitement it was not unnatural for her to overlook the presence of her children, and that the alleged refusal of the appellant to share the produce of the land could not have moved mother and daughter to accuse him falsely of so serious an offense. On the absence of motive, the Court ruled that motive is pertinent only when there is doubt as to the identity of the culprit, and since the accused was positively identified by credible witnesses, proof of motive was not essential for conviction. On the alibi, the Court held that alibi cannot prevail over positive testimonies of identification by credible witnesses, and that in any event it was not physically impossible for the accused to be at the scene at six o'clock in the morning, since the distance of four kilometers could be covered in thirty minutes by hiking.

On the second issue, the Court disagreed with the trial court. Considering that the victim had already fallen helpless and was in a lying position when he was hacked by the appellant, the Court entertained no doubt that the appellant intended to kill the victim. The nature of the weapon used and the fact that the attack was characterized by treachery, since the assailants waited in ambush for their victim, were also demonstrative of that intent. The mitigating circumstance of lack of intent to commit so grave a wrong as that committed was therefore improperly appreciated.

On the third issue, the Court held that the penalty for murder is reclusion temporal in its maximum period to death, and that there being neither aggravating nor mitigating circumstance, the penalty should be imposed in its medium period, which is reclusion perpetua. The Court also increased the indemnity to twelve thousand pesos, following its jurisprudence, and directed that the appellant be credited with the full time of his preventive imprisonment upon a showing that he agreed to abide by the same disciplinary rules imposed upon convicted prisoners, otherwise with four fifths of that time.

Doctrine

First, alibi cannot prevail over the positive testimonies of identification by credible witnesses, and it must fail where it was not physically impossible for the accused to be at the scene of the crime at the time of its commission. Second, motive is pertinent only when there is doubt as to the identity of the culprit; where the accused is positively identified by credible witnesses, proof of motive is not essential for conviction. Third, the mitigating circumstance under paragraph 3 of Article 13 of the Revised Penal Code, that the offender had no intention to commit so grave a wrong as that committed, cannot be credited where the evidence shows a deliberate intent to kill, as where the victim was already fallen and helpless when hacked, and the nature of the weapon and the treachery of the attack demonstrate that intent. Fourth, where neither aggravating nor mitigating circumstance attends the commission of murder, the penalty under Article 248 of the Revised Penal Code is imposed in its medium period, which is reclusion perpetua.

Disposition

The Supreme Court affirmed the decision of the trial court as to the conviction but modified it by increasing the penalty to reclusion perpetua and the indemnity to twelve thousand pesos, with the credit for preventive imprisonment as directed, and with costs against the appellant.

Remember This

The single line worth memorizing is that alibi cannot prevail over positive identification by credible witnesses, and that the mitigating circumstance of no intent to commit so grave a wrong as that committed cannot be credited where the victim was already helpless and the weapon and the treachery show a deliberate intent to kill. Examiners like to use this case on the interplay between alibi and positive identification, on the irrelevance of motive once identity is established, and on the correct medium period of the penalty for murder when no modifying circumstance attends its commission.