THE PEOPLE OF THE PHILIPPINES, PLAINTIFF AND APPELLEE, VS. EDUARDO BERDIDA Y INGUITO, ET AL., DEFENDANTS, EDUARDO BERDIDA Y INGUTO, LORETO SABERON Y CASAS, VICENTE ABERAS Y CORD…

This is an automatic review of death sentence pursuant to the Rules of Court.^[1]

On 10 May I960, an information for frustrated murder^[2] of Antonio Maravilla and another Information for murder^[3]
of Federico Caflalete, were filed in the Court of First Instance of
Manila. Said informations were directed against the same eight accused:
Eduardo Berdida y Inguito, Jesus Felicia y Balidbld, Vicente Aberas y
Cordero, Cristoto Mitilla y Paral, Demetrio Oarin y Payos, Protacio
Libres y Corona, Loreto Saberon y Casas and Mario Mustrado y Sumaya.

After the defendants pleaded not guilty at their
arraignment on 16 May 1960, the two cases were tried jointly. Acting on
a motion to dismiss filed by defendants Cristoto Mitilla and Mario
Mustrado, after the prosecution rested its case, the court dismissed
the charges againat Mario Mustrado, with costs de oficio. After
the trial, the Court of First Instance rendered on 27 July 1962 the
decision now under review. Its dispositive portion states:

“IN
VIEW OF THE FOREGOING CONSIDERATION, the Court finds the defendants
Eduardo Berdlda, Loreto Saberon, Vicente Aberas.and Jesus Felicia
guilty beyond reasonable doubt of the crime of murder. This Court has
in previous cases endeavored to avoid the imposition of the capital
punishment. In the case at bar, however, where the offenders,
pretending to be police officers, kidnapped the victims and mercilessly
beat one of them to death, the Court finds no other alternative, in
pursuance to the mandate of the law, but to impose, as it hereby
imposes upon the said defendants, the death penalty, to indemnify
jointly and severally the heirs of Federico Cañalete in the sum of
P4,000.00 and to pay the costs. May God have mercy on their souls.

“In Criminal Case No. 52338, above-said defendants are also hereby
found guilty beyond reasonable doubt of the crime of attempted murder
and considering the aggravating circumstances present, they are
sentenced each to suffer a maximum penalty of TEN (10) YEARS of prision
mayor and a minimum of SIX (6) YEARS of prision correccional, and to
pay the costs, without prejudice on the part of the complainant to
institute a separate civil action for the recovery of damages.

“The
defendants Garin, Mitilla and Libres are hereby acquitted, in both
cases, with costs de oficio, and their immediate release is hereby
ordered,

“SO ORDERED.”

The records show the prosecution’s evidence, as follows:

At
about 10 o’clock in the evening of 7 May 1960, Antonio Maravilla,
Federico Cañalete, Virgllio Haban and Fedrito Rapadas left the store of
one Mang Terio at Mabuhay Street, North Harbor, Tondo, Manila, and
proceeded walking towards their homes. They were met on their way by
Eduardo Berdida, Antonio Louie, one Tiquio and one alias Ifugao, who identified themselves as detectives, told them not to move, and pointed sharp and long bolos at them.^[4]
Antonio Maravllla and Federico Cañalete raised their hands, but
Pedrito Rapadas and Virgllio Haban were able to run away. Antonio Louie
then dealt a fist blow on Antonio Maravllla. After that, the group took
Antonio Maravilla and Federico Cañalete along the rail tracks, telling
them that they had done something wrong.

At the end of the
rail tracks, said group tied the hands of Antonio Maravilla and
Federico Cañalete. After doing this, they dragged the two and took
them to a place in Pier 8 at the North Harbor near Vicente Aberas’
house. In said place, there were others who joined the group, among
them, Jesus Felicia, Loreto Saberon and Vicente Aberas. At this point,
Eduardo Berdida told Antonio Maravilla and Federico Cañalete to dig
their graves, but they refused. Arturo Macabebe, who also joined the
group, took two sticks of cigarettes and told Antonio Maravilla and
Federico Cañalete to smoke. Antonio Maravilla again refused. Following
said refusal, the victims were hit with a piece of wood. Eduardo
Berdlda and Jesus Felicia then held Antonio Maravllla and Federiso
Cañalete, respectively, by the hands and from behind. As they were
thus held, Vioente Aberas delivered fist blows on them, first on
Antonio Maravllla, then on Federico Cañalete.^[5] Furthermore, Loreto Saberon also held Pederico Cañalete while others gave fist blows to the latter.^[6]
At about 1 o’clock in the morning of 8 May 1960, Antonio Maravilla lost
consciousness, shortly after hearing Loreto Saberon say that the group
would cut off the ears of Antonio Maravilla and Federico Cañalete, for
appetizer or “pulutan.”^[7]

Antonio Maravilla’s sister, Elizabeth, had meanwhile been informed by
Virgilio Haban, one of those who were able to run away, that her
brother and Federico Cañalete were taken by armed men. She therefore
went out with some companions in search of her brother. She asked the
help of Patrolman Carlos Pili, who was then at the corner of
Kagultingan and Lakandula Streets in front of Pier 6. Patrolmen Amado
Santos and Pabrloante also joined them. As the other policemen took to
separate directions, Patrolman Pill and Elizabeth Haravilla went along
Mabuhay Street. They came upon a group of men, between Piers 6 and 8,
who were hesitant to answer their inquiries. So they proceeded further,
entering a small alley. As they went on, Elizabeth found the shoes of
her brother. So they continued until they met Vicente Aberaa, stripped
to the waist, with bloodstains on his hands.^[8]
Patrolman Pill detained him. Since somebody threatened them should they
proceed any further. Patrolman Pill and Elizabeth Maravllla went to
Precinct 3, taking along Vicente Aberas. Assistance from the Mobile
Patrol was then requested. Accompanied by her neighbors and more
policemen, Elizabeth, together with Patrolman Pill, returned and went
further to the interior of Mabuhay Street. Finally, they cams upon
Federico Cañalete and Antonio Maravllla, sprawled on the ground, the
former face down, the latter flat on his back. Federico Cañalete was
found dead. Antonio Maravllla was alive, though his face was swollen,
rendering him barely recognizable. Antonio Maravilla was taken to the
North General Hospital.

Patrolman Pill, meanwhile, went
still further to the interior and saw, about 12 meters away from where
they found the victims, a group drinking liquor. At the approach of
Patrolman Pill, about four men ran away, leaving behind four men,
namely, Loreto Saberon, Mario Mustrado, Cristoto Mitilla and Protaelo
Libres, the last mentioned being then drunk and asleep on a bamboo bed.^[9]
A Mobile Patrol car thereafter arrived and apprehended them, except
Libres. Patrolman Pill next went towards a house near Tagumpay Street
in which direction the others had fled. In said house, which was that
of Crisanta Melgar, the patrolman found some persons who pretended to
be sleeping, namely, Demetrio Garin, Jesus Felicia and Eduardo Berdida.
Patrolman Fill brought them outside, and they were taken by the Mobile
Patrol to the Detective Bureau.

Furthermore, the body of
Federico Cañalete was examined at the scene where it was found by
officers of the Mobile Patrol. Detective Bureau agents likewise went
to”said place. Finding bloodstains near an alley to Tagumpay Street,
they went to a house thereat and found Protacio Libres sleeping on a
bamboo bed. Said detectives took Libres to the headquarters.

At
the police station, all the apprehended suspects were made to mingle
with other persons. Antonio Mara villa, who was fetched to point out
therefrom the persons who attacked him and Federico Cafialete,
identified Eduardo Berdida, Vicente Aberas, Loreto Saberon and Jesus
Felicia.

An autopsy was made on 8 May 1960 on the body of
Federico Cañalete by Dr. Luis Larion, Medical Examiner of the Manila
Police Department, The postmortem findings in his report areas follows
(Exh. M):

“CENTRAL NERVOUS SYSTEM

Hemorrhage, extensive, subarachnoid, brain.

CARDIOVASCULAR SYSTEM:

Laceration, blood vessels, brain and spleen.

RESPIRATORY SYSTEM:

Contusion, posterior lung, bilateral. Congestion, lungs, bilateral.

GASTROINTESTINAL SYSTEM:

About 150 cc, partially digested rice meal with slight alcoholic odor.

Hemoperitoneum about 100 cc. blood, abdominal cavity.

SPLEEN: Maceration, spleen.

PANCREAS: Contusion, heraorrhagic, pancreas.

BONE AND JOINTS:

Fracture-separation, left parieto-occipital and right fronto-temporal skull.

MISCELLANEOUS:

Wound, stab, non-penetrating, 1.3 x 0.5 cm. x 1.5 cm. deep, right lumbar region.

Wound, lacerated, 3 x 0.5 cm. occipital region.

Wound, lacerated, 2.5 cm. x 1.5 cm. x 1 cm. deep, non-penetrating, left abdomen.

Hematoma, frontal, right; left, parieto-occipital, and occipital, scalp, head.

Contusion, multiple, left arehead; left lower eyelids; left face; nose;
lower lip; left lateral neck; posterior neck; left shoulder; left and
right posterior chest. Contused abrasion, anterior left lower chest and
right abdomen.

CAUSE OF DEATH:

Shook
and hemorrhage due to traumatic fracture of the skull with maceration
of spleen, contusion of the lungs and extensive subarachnoid
hemorrhages in the brain.” Antonio Maravilla, as shown in the
medico-legal certificate of Dr. Cumalinga Sspinosa of the North
General Hospital (Exh. R), sustained these injuries:

“Contusion with abrasicti, and periorbital hematoma, eye right.
Contusion upper and lower lip.
Contusion 2 mental region. Contusion with Blight hematoma, malar right, and mandible bilateral.
Abrasion 3″, lateral neck left.
Abrasion, 2″ No. 2 level of the 10th rib right, along the MCL.”

For the defense of herein appellants, the following evidence was presented to establish alibi:

Sometime between 7 and 8 o’clock in the evening of 7 May
I960 Crisanta Halgar was filling drums with water in her house at 1205
Tagumpay Street, Tondo, Manila, Shortly thereafter, Eduardo Berdida,
Iioreto Saberon and Jesus Felicia arrived. Since her husband was on
night duty and her brother-in-law was ill, Crisanta Helgar asked the
three to remain and help her fill up the drums with water, intending to
sell the sane the next morning. Said defendants consented and for some
tine helped Crisanta fill the drums with water. At about 9 o’clock in
the evening, however, said defendants went to sleep in the ground floor
of Crlsanta1s new house, still under construction, adjacent to the
house aforementioned. At about midnight, a policeman and. someone in
civilian clothes knocked at the door and inquired from Crisanta if
there were three persons sleeping in her house. She said yes, and
opened the door. The policeman then told Crisanta that a dead man was
found near their place. The one in civilian attire went to the bade of
the house. Crisanta told the policeman she mew nothing of any incident
and that the three men had been in her house for some time. She then
awoke the defendants Berdida, Saberon and Felicia. The policeman told
them to stand up and the man in civilian was asked if they were the
ones involved. Said man looked at the defendants and replied in the
negative. The policeman and the civilian then left and the defendants
went back to sleep. After a while, Crisanta, who was restless and could
not sleep, went down, awoke the defendants, and told them that it was
better for them to leave. So, the said defendants left, but a policeman
stopped them at Tagurapay Street and took them to the police
headquarters.

As to the defendant Vicente Aberas, his defense of alibi is as follows:

In the evening of 7 May 1960, he was on board the fishing boat “Bon
Paulino.” At about 10:30 o’clock in the evening, after unloading their
catch of fish, he left for home, bringing with him a tulingan
fish. Juan, a co-worker of his, invited him to drink beer in a store
near Pier 8. For some time they stayed there, then he left for home. On
the way he met five men beating up somebody. Approaching them, he asked
them to have pity on the man and not to, beat him. Someone in the
group, armed with a club, warned him not to interfere, so, becoming
afraid, he left. In reaching home, he took off his shirt, out the fish
he brought with him in half, lengthwise, and took one of the halves to
the house of Smiliano Retone, another co-worker of his, who did not
report for work that day. Retone invited him to drink gin. After
drinking, he headed for home, but on his way he met two policemen and a
woman. After being asked where he came from, which he answered, and
whether he had seen a fight, to which he said yes, he was taken to
Precinct 3.

Appellants would, first of all, assail Antonio
Maravilla’s testimony identifying them as the assailants, for the
reason that he lost consciousness, and, therefore, could not be relied
upon to make said identification. Appellants would further insist on
their defense of alibi. Antonio Maravllla, it is true, lost
consciousness, at about 1 o’clock in the morning of & May 1960. If
is however equally true that before his senses faded out he saw herein
appellants perform their atrocities on himself as well as on Federico
Cañalete. it cannot therefore be doubted that he made no mistake in
pointing out to herein appellants as definitely among their assailants.
This he did, not only at the police station but also in open court
during the trial. It is furthermore not disputed by
defendants-appellants that Antonio Maravilla has no reason or motive to
falsely accuse them of murder and attempted murder. The positive
identification he made must therefore be given full credence.

It
follows that the defense of alibi cannot be sustained. The rule is
settled, to the point of being trite, that the defense of alibi is
worthless in the face of positive identification by prosecution
witnesses, pointing to the accused as participants in the crime.^[10]

The
trial court, moreover,, found the above-related defenses of alibi not
credible. For, according to said court, If defendants Berdida, Felicia
and Saber on really went to help Crisanta Melgar, their provincemate,
fill drums with water at her house. It is rather unusual that they all
went to sleep at about 9 o’clock in the evening. Furthermore, the
policeman who inquired about persons sleeping in Crisanta Melgar(s
house strangely knew their number, that 10, three persons, And,
finally, it is unbelievable that said policeman did not take them to
the headquarters for identification by Antonio Maravilla himself.

And,
with respect to the defendant-appellant Vicente Aberas, the trial court
found it too surprising to believe that he went to such lengths of
amiability, as to go, shirtless at that, to his friend Retone, at an
unholy hour, to share with him one-half of his tulingan fish.
No previous agreement, or urgent need for such an act obtained. It
could have waited for the next morning, especially since, having
allegedly came from work, defendant Aberas must have been tired.

As
this Court stated in People vs. Constante, L-14639, December 28, 1964,
the defense of alibi is an issue of fact that hinges on credibility;
that the credibility of an alibi depends so much on the credibility of
the witnesses who seek to establish it; and that, in this respect, the
relative weight which the trial Judge assigns to the testimony of said
witnesses must, unless patently and clearly inconsistent with the
evidence on record, be accepted. For, as is well recognized, his
proximate contact with those who take to the witness chair places him,
compared to appellate Justices, in the more competent position to
discriminate between the true and the false.

And in the
present appeal, we find no warrant to depart from the lower court’s
finding on defendants-appellants’ defenses of alibi.

It is
also contended by appellants that the aggravating circumstances of
nighttime, abuse of superior strength, and evident premeditation should
not be appreciated in fixing the penalty. Appellants would argue that
nighttime was not purposely sought to facilitate the offense or to
afford impunity. At any rate, they would further argue, nighttime as
well as abuse of superior strength are deemed absorbed in treachery. As
to evident premeditation, they aver that the premeditation, if any, is
not evident, for lack of sufficient lapse of time between the execution
of the offense and a previous showing of intent to commit it, so as to
show that the offenders clung to their determination to commit the
crime.

The presence of one generic aggravating circumstance,
apart from the qualifying circumstance of treachery, suffices to fix
the penalty for murder at the extreme punishment of death. For there is
no mitigating circumstance in the present case. Prom the facts and
evidence of record in this case it is clear that appellants took
advantage of nighttime in committing the felonies charged. For it
appears that to carry out a sentence they had pronounced upon Antonio
Maravilla and Federico Cañalete for the death of one Pabling, they had
evidently chosen to execute their victims under cover of darkness, at
the dead of night, when the neighborhood was asleep. Inasmuch as the
treachery consisted in the fact that the victims’ hands were tied at
the time they were beaten, the circumstance of nighttime is not
absorbed in treachery, but can be perceived distinctly therefrom, since
the treachery rests upon an independent factual basis. A special case
therefore is present to which the rule that nighttime is absorbed in
treachery does not apply.^[11]

In
addition, the presence of evident premeditation is likewise borne out
by the record. For the victims were told at the start, when they were
taken captives, that they had done something wrong, that they were the
ones who stabbed and killed one Pabling, and that for this reason they
were to go with the group (T.s.n., 10 October 1960, pp. 20, 22; Exh.
D). Not only that; the victims were then taken to a spot where they
were ordered to dig their graves. The assailants were previously armed
with deadly weapons, and their assault was a concerted and group
action. From the time of apprehension of the victims, about 10 o’clock
in the evening, to the time Antonio Maravilla lost consciousness, about
1 o’clock early the following morning, is sufficient time for the
offenders to meditate and reflect on the consequences of their act.

In People vs.
Lopez, 69 Phil, 298, this Court found the aggravating circumstance of
evident premeditation present, in view of the repeated statements of
the defendants that the hour of reckoning of the victim would arrive,
the existing enmity between them, the fact that they were previously
armed with deadly weapons, and the fact that the aggression was
simultaneous and continuous until tne deceased was left unconscious on
the ground. And in People vs. Lazada, 70 Phil. 525, four hours
was held sufficient lapse of time for purposes of the presence of
evident premeditation. Furthermore, sufficient lapse of time in this
regard is not simply a matter of the precise number of hours, but of
the reasonable opportunity, under the situation and circumstances, to
ponder and reflect upon the consequences. In the present case, we find
the facts and circumstances obtaining sufficient to support the trial
court’s finding of the attendance of evident premeditation.

Following previous instances, the indemnity to the heirs of the deceased in this case should be increased to P6,000.^[12]

Anent
the attempted murder case, no appeal therefrom was taken. The record
shows that defendants perfected no appeal from the Judgment below. The
present automatic review is limited only to the murder case in which
the death penalty was imposed. It was only because of the Joint trial
that the record of the attempted murder case was likewise elevated
herein. Since no appeal was taken in the attempted murder case, the
Judgment with respect there-to has become final. It therefore cannot
now be reviewed herein, as some of tie appellants would ask. And
defendants-appellants, who are detained, should accordingly be deemed
to have started serving their respective sentence in said attempted
murder case from the time the decision of the trial court became final
as to said case.

WHEREFORE, the death penalty
imposed on defendants-appellants is hereby affirmed, and the indemnity
to the heirs of Federico Cañalete is hereby Increased from P4,000 to
P6,000, with costs.

SO ORDERED.

Concepcion, C.J., Reyes, J.B.L., Barrera, Dizon, Regala, Makalintal, Bengzon, J.P., Zaldivar, and Sanchez, JJ., concur.

^[1] Sec. 9, Rule 122, formerly Sec. 9, Rule 118.

^[2] Docketed In the CFI as Crim. Case No. 52338.

^[3] Docketed in the CFI as Crim. Case No. 52339.

^[4] T.s.n., 10 October 1960, p. 13.

^[5] T.s.n., 10 October 1960, p. 14.

^[6] T.s.n., 23 November 1960, p. 2.

^[7] T.s.n., 23 November 1960, p. 2.

^[8] T.s.n., 13 July 1961, pp. 2, 4.

^[9] T.s.n., 27 March 1961, p. 48.

^[10] People vs. Tansiangco, L-19448, February 28, 1964; People vs. Riveral, L-14077., March 31, 1964.

^[11] See People vs. John Doe, L-2463, March 31, 1950; 2 Viada, Codigo Penal,
274-275.

^[12] People vs. Hernandez, 91 Phil. 334; People vs. Banlos, L-3413, December 29, 1955.