THE PEOPLE OF THE PHILIPPINES, PLAINTIFF-APPELLEE, VS. JOSE PINCALIN, RODOLFO BELTRAN, EDUARDO EMPLEO AND ALEJANDRO JANDOMON, ACCUSED-APPELLANTS.

People versus Pincalin

The Case

This is a criminal case in which the People of the Philippines prosecuted Jose Pincalin, Rodolfo Beltran, Eduardo Empleo, and Alejandro Jandomon for the killing of two fellow prisoners and the wounding of a third inside the national penitentiary. The accused were themselves convicts serving sentences, and the killings arose from the violent feud between Visayan and Tagalog gangs. The case matters to a reviewee because it fixes the rule on when several acts done in pursuance of one criminal purpose amount to a single complex crime, and because it shows the Court reducing a death sentence to reclusion perpetua on the ground of the inhuman congestion in the penitentiary.

Procedural History

The special prosecutor filed an information against the four accused for murder and frustrated murder, qualified by treachery and evident premeditation, and alleging that the offenses were committed while they were serving sentences in the national penitentiary. Upon arraignment, all four pleaded not guilty. The trial court convicted them of murder, which it regarded as a complex crime qualified by treachery and aggravated by evident premeditation and quasi-recidivism, and sentenced each to one death penalty, with an indemnity of twenty thousand pesos to the heirs of the two deceased victims. The trial court also convicted them of frustrated murder and imposed an indeterminate penalty, with an indemnity of twelve thousand pesos. The accused did not appeal from that decision. Because the death penalty was imposed, the case was elevated to the Supreme Court for automatic review. Accused Beltran died in prison of tuberculosis, and by resolution his criminal liability was extinguished. Counsel de oficio was designated to present the side of the remaining accused on review.

Facts

At around eight forty-five in the morning of Good Friday, April 9, 1971, certain Visayan prisoners, members of the Oxo gang, were killed by fellow prisoners from Luzon, members of the Sigue-Sigue Sputnik gang. To avenge those killings, the four accused, Visayans and members of the Oxo and Happy-Go-Lucky gangs, conspired at about ten o'clock that same morning to kill Sputnik members in dormitory 6-A of the New Bilibid Prison. They agreed that Pincalin would kill Leonardo Francisco, that Beltran and Empleo would kill Victorino Abril, and that Jandomon would kill Florentino Tilosa. They armed themselves with improvised bladed weapons known among prisoners as matalas.

About an hour later, they carried out the plan. Beltran and Empleo approached Abril as he sat on his bed and stabbed him; when Abril fell, Empleo stabbed him six times and Beltran five times. Jandomon stabbed Tilosa near the door repeatedly until he collapsed. Pincalin stabbed Francisco in the abdomen near the waist, and Francisco escaped further assault by climbing a window. The four then surrendered with their weapons to a prison inspector and a prison guard, and on the same day executed separate extrajudicial confessions in Tagalog, sworn to before the Assistant Director of Prisons.

The autopsy showed that Tilosa suffered eight stab wounds and Abril fourteen. Francisco sustained a serious stab wound which was sutured and later operated on. The main evidence against the accused was their extrajudicial confessions, testified to by the prison-guard investigator who took them. At the trial, all four repudiated their confessions, but each admitted that he had not been maltreated or intimidated by the investigator.

Issues

• Whether or not the guilt of the accused was proven beyond reasonable doubt, considering that the case hinges on the probative value of their extrajudicial confessions.
• Whether or not the trial court erred in imposing the death penalty, considering the inhuman congestion in the national penitentiary.
• Whether or not the several killings and the wounding, committed in pursuance of a single conspiracy and a single purpose, constitute a single complex crime.

Applicable Provisions

Article 48 of the Revised Penal Code, as quoted in the dissenting opinion, defines when a complex crime arises:

When a single act constitutes two or more grave or less grave felonies, or when an offense is a necessary means for committing the other, the penalty for the most serious crime shall be imposed, the same to be applied in its maximum period.

This provision bears on the case because the Court had to decide whether the acts of the accused fell within its terms, that is, whether there was a single act or several acts.

Article 160 of the Revised Penal Code, referred to by the trial court, defines quasi-recidivism:

Any person who shall commit a felony after having been convicted by final judgment, before beginning to serve such sentence, or while serving the same, shall be punished by the maximum period of the penalty prescribed by law for the new felony.

This provision bears on the case because the accused committed the offenses while serving sentences in the national penitentiary, which the Court treated as an aggravating circumstance.

Ruling

On the first issue, the Court held that the confessions should be regarded as conclusive proof of guilt. It took into account the testimony of the investigator on their voluntariness, the admission of the accused that they signed without maltreatment or intimidation, and the absence of any reason why the investigator would falsely impute to them the commission of two murders and one frustrated murder by fabricating their confessions.

On the second issue, the Court held that the death penalty should be reduced to reclusion perpetua, following the precedent in the De los Santos, Abella, and Garcia cases, which involved killings committed on the same day and arising from the same gang feud.

On the third issue, the Court held that the four accused are guilty of the complex crime of double murder and frustrated murder, aggravated by quasi-recidivism. It reasoned that when, for the attainment of a single purpose which constitutes an offense, various acts are executed, those acts must be considered as only one offense, a complex one. Where a conspiracy animates several persons with a single purpose, their individual acts done in pursuance of that purpose are looked upon as a single act, the act of execution, giving rise to a complex offense. The Court noted that the killings in this case were the fourth incident which transpired on that Good Friday.

Doctrine

When, for the attainment of a single purpose which constitutes an offense, various acts are executed, those acts must be considered as only one offense, a complex one. Where a conspiracy animates several persons with a single purpose, their individual acts done in pursuance of that purpose are looked upon as a single act, the act of execution, giving rise to a complex offense under Article 48 of the Revised Penal Code. Quasi-recidivism under Article 160 aggravates the offense when the felony is committed while the offender is serving sentence. A death sentence may be reduced to reclusion perpetua where the inhuman congestion in the national penitentiary is taken into account, following the De los Santos, Abella, and Garcia precedents.

Disposition

The trial court's judgment was set aside, and Pincalin, Empleo, and Jandomon were each sentenced to reclusion perpetua and to pay solidarily twelve thousand pesos to each set of heirs of Abril and Tilosa and six thousand pesos to Francisco, with costs de oficio.

Remember This

The single line worth memorizing is that various acts done in pursuance of one criminal purpose under a conspiracy are looked upon as a single act of execution, giving rise to a complex offense. Examiners use this case to test the distinction between a complex crime and separate offenses, and to illustrate the reduction of a death penalty to reclusion perpetua on grounds of penitentiary congestion.