THE PEOPLE OF THE PHILIPPINES, PLAINTIFF-APPELLEE, VS. PORFIRIO DUMDUM, JR. AND RENATO PERALTA, DEFENDANTS WHOSE DEATH SENTENCES ARE UNDER REVIEW.

This is a review en consulta of
the decision of the Circuit Criminal Court at Pasig, Rizal,
convicting Porfirio Dumdum, Jr. and Renato Peralta of murder, sentencing each of them to death
and ordering them to pay solidarily a total indemnity
of P32,000 to the heirs of the deceased Dionisio Macadangdang (Criminal
Case No. 961).

At about one o’clock in
the afternoon of September 7, 1971,
Macadangdang, 38, was stabbed in the national
penitentiary at Muntinlupa, Rizal.  He sustained three incised wounds
located on the neck, right arm and left hand and eight stab wounds:  four on the chest, one on the abdomen, one on
the right shoulder and two in the lumbar region.  The wounds on the chest, which affected his
heart, lung, liver and stomach, were fatal. 
The victim died at the prison hospital.

Dumdum, 24, a native of Bacolod City, a
prisoner serving sentence for theft, and Peralta, 21, a native of Iloilo City,
a prisoner serving sentence for robbery, both members of the Happy Go Lucky
gang, were investigated in the afternoon of the same day, September 7, 1971, in
connection with the killing of Macadangdang.

They declared in their confessions that they waited for the
victim and assaulted him when he passed in front of the Four Square Chapel of
the New Bilibid Prison.  The victim came from the hospital and was
going to the vocational school.  He fell
into the gutter with a bladed weapon sticking on his back.

Dumdum stabbed Macadangdang with an
improvised bladed weapon three times on the chest and abdomen.  Peralta stabbed him five times also with an
improvised double-bladed weapon which he left in the victim’s back when he
(Peralta) ran away.  The weapons were
presented in evidence.

The killing was planned an hour before it was perpetrated.  The motive was revenge.  Dumdum and Peralta purposed to avenge the
stabbing of Lolito Fabella,
the “mayor” of their gang, by the Tagalog group
belonging to the Komando
and Bahala gangs.

A special prosecutor filed on January 15, 1972 an information
for murder against Dumdum and Peralta. 
It was alleged therein that the two accused while confined in prison and
as confederates armed with improvised
weapons treacherously assaulted Macadangdang
who was unarmed and who died as a result of the assault.  Premeditation was alleged as an aggravating
circumstance.

At their arraignment, the accused were assisted by a counsel de
oficio. 
The information was read to them in Tagalog, a
dialect which they know.  After they had
pleaded guilty, the trial judge asked them separately whether they knew when
they pleaded guilty that they would be punished.  They answered in the affirmative.

They told the court that it was already a long time that they
thought of pleading guilty, that they were not forced to make that plea and
that due to remorse they had to admit the commission of the crime.

The trial judge reminded the two accused that under article 160
of the Revised Penal Code he had no alternative but to impose upon them the
death penalty.  Dumdum said that he knew
he would die in the electric chair. 
Peralta made the same admission.

Sometime after the arraignment, the trial court held a hearing
for the presentation of the prosecution’s evidence.  The two investigators who took the
confessions of the accused and the doctor who performed the autopsy
testified.  They were cross-examined by
the counsel de oficio.

The prosecutor offered in evidence the two confessions, the
necropsy report, the photographs of the wounds and the two improvised bladed
weapons.

As already stated, the trial court sentenced the two accused to
death.  They did not appeal.  Counsel de oficio
in his brief argues that the trial court erred in convicting the accused on the
basis of their plea of guilty.  He
contends that there was no showing that the accused had been properly arraigned
and that they were aware of the gravity of the offense charged.

That contention has no merit. 
The trial court complied with its duty to see to it that the accused did
not make any improvident plea of guilty. 
The judicial confessions were confirmed by the evidence of the
prosecution which was sufficient for the conviction of the accused even if they
did not plead guilty.

The guilt of the accused was established beyond reasonable
doubt.  The crime committed by them is asesinato qualified by treachery absorbing abuse of
superiority.  They deliberately
perpetrated a surprise assault on the unarmed victim without giving him a
chance to defend himself.

Their confessions seem to indicate that the killing was
aggravated by evident premeditation because they conceived of the assault at
least one hour before its perpetration. 
Even if that circumstance is not taken into account, the penalty would
still be death in view of the special aggravating circumstance of
quasi-recidivism which justifies the imposition, in the maximum period, of reclusion
temporal maximum to death, the penalty for murder.

For that same reason, the mitigating circumstances of plea of
guilty and voluntary surrender to the authorities would not preclude the
imposition of the death penalty.

The instant case is similar to People vs. Santos and Vicente, 105
Phil. 40, People vs. Ala, 109 Phil. 390, People vs. Yamson
and Romero, 109 Phil. 793, People vs. Yamson, 111
Phil. 406, People vs. Perete, 111 Phil. 943, People
vs. Peralta, 113 Phil. 201, and People vs. Layson,
L-25177, October 31, 1969, 30 SCRA 92, where the accused prisoners killed their
fellow prisoners and were sentenced to death on the basis of their plea of
guilty.

The stringent requirements of section 20, Article IV of the
Constitution as to extrajudicial confessions taken during custodial
interrogation are not applicable to this case because the confessions were
taken before the effectivity of the Constitution (See
Magtoto vs. Manguera, L-37201-02, Simeon vs. Villaluz, L-37424 and People vs.
Isnani, L-38929, all decided on March 3, 1975, 63 SCRA 4).  The accused herein did not impugn the voluntariness of their confessions.

The trial court committed an irregularity in pronouncing judgment
on the two accused in open court immediately after they had pleaded guilty and
then later on requiring the prosecution to present evidence.

However, that irregularity does not justify the setting aside of
the judgment of conviction which is supported by the judicial and extrajudicial
confessions of the accused and by other evidence.

Trial judges are advised not to follow the erroneous, reverse
procedure adopted by the trial judge in this case.  It is not correct to sentence the accused to
death immediately after he had pleaded guilty and then to require the
prosecutor to present his evidence.

The evidence of the prosecution should be presented after the
arraignment.  The judgment should be
rendered and promulgated after the fiscal has presented his evidence and
after the trial court has ascertained that the defense is not presenting any evidence.

WHEREFORE, the trial court’s judgment is affirmed.  Costs de oficio.

SO ORDERED.

Barredo, Makasiar,
Antonio, Aquino, Concepcion,
Jr., Fernandez, Guerrero, De Castro, and Melencio-Herrera, JJ., concur.

Fernando, C.J., took no part.

Teehankee, J., concurs in a separate opinion.

Santos and Abad Santos, JJ., was abroad.