G.R. No. L-17215-17. February 28, 1967
THE PEOPLE OF THE PHILIPPINES, PLAINTIFF-APPELLEE, VS. CATALINO SANTOS ALIAS LINO, DEFENDANT-APPELLANT.
CONCEPCION, C.J.:
Appeal from a decision of the Court of First Instance of Nueva Vizcaya in three
interrelated cases, which were jointly tried.
In G.R. Nos. L-17215 and L-17216 (Criminal Cases No. 798 and 800
of said court) appellants Catalino Santos and Tabbegat Bocto were respectively
convicted of illegal possession of a firearm and ammunitions, and each
sentenced to an indeterminate penalty of imprisonment ranging from five (5) to
seven (7) years and to pay the corresponding costs.
In G.R. No. L-17217 (Criminal Case No. 802 of the same court),
said appellants Santos and Bocto, as well as
appellants Pablo Basilio ang
Singgup Olmehemet, were
convicted of three murders, qualified by treachery, with the generic
aggravating circumstances of evident premeditation, commission of the offense
in an inhabited place, with the use of unlicensed firearms, and by a band,
without any mitigating circumstance to offset the same, and sentenced as
follows: (a) Santos, as leader and
mastermind, to the extreme penalty “for each of the deaths of Flaviano Fontanilla, Raymundo Fontanilla and Victorino Fontanilla;” (b) Basilio and Bocto, as ignorant
followers of Catalina Santos, to suffer each three (3) life imprisonments,
with the corresponding accessory penalties; and (c) Olmehemet,
as a minor and ignorant follower of Catalino Santos,
to an indeterminate penalty ranging from eight (8) years and one (1) day of prision mayor to seventeen (17) years
and four (4) months of reclusion temporal, “for each death
of the said Fontanillas,” with the corresponding
accessory penalties, in addition to the four (4) appellants indemnifying,
jointly and severally, the heirs of each one of said deceased persons in the
sum of P6,000, without subsidiary imprisonment in case of insolvency, and to
pay the costs proportionately.
The lower court, likewise, ordered one-half of the preventive
imprisonment respectively suffered by appellants to be credited to them, as
well as the confiscation of the firearms, boloes and
ammunitions used in the commission of the offense.
The main facts are: While Flaviano Fontanilla and his sons,
Raymundo and Victorino,
together with Artemio Simanero,
were walking, in single file, on the trail along the river bank of Sagat Creek, headed for the sitio
of Dinatay, municipality of Aglipay,
Nueva Vizcaya, on March 12,
1958, at about 2:00 p.m., they were shot by several persons who laid in wait, in foxholes, several feet
away. As the Fontanillas
were felled by the bullets, Simanero retreated
and took cover behind some stone boulders, protected by a screen of tall grasses,
locally known as “talahib,” and trees, some
distance away. Meanwhile, the ambushers
had jumped out of their foxholes and beheaded their victims, as well as hacked
their bodies and dismembered one of them, after which they went away, going
upstream. Then, Simanero
left his hiding place and, taking the opposite direction, proceeded to Guinalbin, Aglipay, where he
reported the occurrence to Donato Ruiz, the chief of
police. The latter, in turn, relayed the
news to the local PC detachment. Thereupon,
PC Cpl. Bulanos, and Simanero,
leading a posse, proceeded, on foot, to the scene of the crime – which they
reached at about 2:00 a.m. – picked up the remains of the Fontanillas and brought them to the municipal
building, where the justice of the peace held, in the morning of March 13, an
inquest, in the course of which Simanero revealed
that the Fontanillas had been killed by Ilongots.
Hence, Simanero was brought to the
place, near the municipal building, where all Ilongots
found nearby had, meanwhile, been rounded up and kept. Simanero readily
identified, from among them, herein appellants, Catalino
Santos (alias Lino), Tabbegat
Bocto, Pablo Basilio, and Singgup Olmehemet, apart from one
Obdiy-ya Antolin, as the
culprits, who, accordingly, were detained and investigated. That same day, a complaint for multiple
murder was filed against them with the Justice of the Peace Court of Agalipay. Three (3)
days later, complaints for illegal possession of firearm and ammunitions were,
also, filed against Santos and Bocto. At the
preliminary hearing before said court, on March 25, 1958, appellants, upon being informed, by the
Justice of the Peace, who presided it, of the charges against them, pleaded
guilty to said charges.
Subsequently, or on April 19, 1958, the provincial fiscal filed,
with the Court of First Instance of Nueva Vizcaya, an information for illegal possession of firearm
and ammunitions, against Catalino Santos, alias
Lino (Criminal Case No. 798 of said Court); another
information, for a similar offense, against Tabbegat
Bocto (Criminal Case No. 800 of said Court); and a
third information, against Catalino Santos, alias
Lino, Pablo Basilio, Tabbegat Bocto, Singgup Olmehemet and Obdiy-ya Antolin, for multiple
murder. On motion of the prosecution, Antolin was, later discharged from the information in the
latter case, to be a state witness.
After due trial, thereafter, judgment was rendered as above
indicated. Hence, these appeals by the
convicted defendants.
The main issue for determination is one of fact. In G.R. No. L-17217 the question is: Who killed the Fontanillas? Testifying on their own behalf, appellants
pleaded absolute innocence. However, two
(2) eye witnesses,
namely, Simanero and Antolin,
positively affirmed the contrary. Simanero declared that, as he hid himself behind some big
boulders, immediately after the Fontanillas had been
shot by their assassins, the latter emerged from the foxholes in which they
were, and turned out to be Catalino Santos, Pablo Basilio, Tabbegat Bocto, Singgup Olmehemet, and state witness Obdiy-ya
Antolin; that he recognized them because they not
only came out of said foxholes, but, also, had spent some time dancing and
shouting merrily, as they beheaded the Fontanillas,
hacked their bodies, and disemboweled them, even tossing at each other the
severed heads of Victorino and Raymundo
Fontanilla, aside from eventually throwing their
bodies into the stream nearby.
This testimony was fully corroborated by Antolin,
who further testified that Santos, Basilio and Bocto had used Japanese rifles – which he identified during
the trial as Exhibits A, B and C, and had been recovered by the authorities,
with his assistance, from a tree in the Dibibi
forest, in which said weapons were hidden – in shooting the Fontanillas;
that the latter were killed because they were going to, and working on, a land
claimed by the Ilongots, whose leader was Santos;
that, in the afternoon of March 11, 1958, Flaviano Fontanilla had asked Santos, in the house of one Elpidio Caliocalio, in Calapitag, to join him the next morning and help in the
cultivation of said land in Dinatay; that, in reply
Santos urged Flaviano to proceed directly to this
place, and gave assurances that he (Santos) and other Ilongots
would follow him thereto; that, Basilio and Bocto were then, likewise, present in said house; that,
early the next morning, Santos, Bocto, Basilio and Olmehemet went to Antolin’s house and invited him to go fishing, in view of
which he joined the group; that, while they were walking along the bank of Addalam River, Santos bade them to hide the fishing
equipment they carried, because they would get firearms in Dibibi
and then ambush the Fontanillas, who were going to work on the aforementioned
land of the Ilongots in Dinatay;
that, thereupon, they proceeded to the aforementioned Dibibi
forest, where Bocto climbed a balete
tree and got three (3) Japanese rifles concealed therein; that, thence, they –
carrying said rifles, as well as boloes and a spear
– proceeded to Sagat Creek, using a trail along Addalam River; that, a short distance away from the bank of
Sagat Creek they dug seven (7) foxholes and then laid
in wait therein; that, when, early in
the afternoon, the Fontanillas passed in front of
them, several feet away from the foxholes, Santos fired at Flaviano
Fontanilla, whereas Basilio
and Bocto shot Raymundo and
Victorino Fontanilla,
respectively; and that, thereafter, appellants and Antolin
emerged from their foxholes and boloed the bodies of
the Fontanillas as well as beheaded the same.
The foregoing direct evidence for the prosecution was corroborated
by the following:
1. When, accompanied by Simanero, peace
officers proceeded to the scene of the crime to recover said bodies of the Fontanillas, they found, inside the foxholes above mentioned,
personal belongings (marked as Exhibits I to I-13, J to J-15 and K to K-4) which on March 13, 1958, appellants admitted to be
theirs;
2. The prosecution introduced, also, in evidence, the confessions
of Catalino Santos, Exhibits N and O, a confession of
Pablo Basilio, Exhibit P, that of Tabbegat
Bocto, Exhibit Q, and that of Singgup
Olmehemet, Exhibit
R, each one of which had been subscribed and sworn to before the justice
of the peace of Aglipay;
3. At the preliminary hearing held before this officer, who translated
the respective informations into the Ilocano dialect, which appellants understand and speak, the
latter entered a plea of guilty, and said officer so stated in his orders of March 25, 1958, forwarding the
records of these cases to the Court of First Instance;
4. Capt. Gregorio Panis of the
Constabulary testified that, upon being investigated by him, Catalino Santos admitted being the owner of the Japanese
rifle Exhibit A, as well as of the spear Exhibit D and two (2) boloes, Exhibits E
and H, apart from the deer skin bag (Exhibit K), containing personal
articles (Exhibits K to K-4), found
in one of the foxholes at the scene of the crime; that Pablo Basilio, in turn, admitted that the Japanese rifle, Exhibit
B, the bolo with its scabbard, Exhibits G and G-1, and a deer skin helmet and
deer skin bag, found in one of the aforementioned foxholes, are, in turn, his
own; and that appellant Bocto admitted that the
Japanese rifle, Exhibit C,
belongs to him and that he has no license to possess the same; that in the
course of the investigation conducted by him (Panis),
which was put in writing (Exhibit N), Santos admitted having committed the
crime charged, because the Fontanillas were clearing
and working on a land claimed by the Ilongots, who, accordingly,
resented it; and that the statement contained in Exhibit N was given by Catalino Santos freely and voluntarily;
5. Upon the other hand, Sgt. Arsenio
Esteban, declared that he took
the confessions, Exhibits O, P, R and Y of Santos, Basilio,
Bocto, Olmehemet and Antolin, respectively; that said confessions were freely
and voluntarily made by the aforementioned defendants, in the dialect known and
spoken by them, and then translated into English; that said confessions were brought, unsigned, before the
justice of the peace of Aglipay, before
whom defendants subscribed their respective confessions and swore to the truths of the contents thereof, after said
justice of the peace had translated the same to them into the local dialect and
ascertained that they had made
it without any compulsion whatsoever; and that appellants Santos, Basilio and Bocto had, likewise,
admitted to him that they owned the aforementioned rifles and had no license to hold the same;
6. Rodolfo G. Hermoso, the justice of
the peace of Aglipay, confirmed the foregoing
evidence regarding the verification of defendants’ confessions Exhibits N, O,
P, Q, R and Y and the fact that they entered a plea of guilty at the
preliminary hearing held before him on March
25, 1958.
Appellants maintain that the lower court had erred in allowing Antolin to be discharged to be a witness for the
prosecution, and in giving credence to his testimony as such, despite his
subsequent recantation and testimony for the defense. The first part of this pretense is based upon
the fact that Simanero had witnessed the occurrence
from which defense counsel deduces that there was no “absolute necessity
for the testimony of the defendant whose discharge” was requested by the
prosecution. The fallacy of this
argument is apparent from the fact that appellants’ counsel assails the
sufficiency of the testimony of Simanero and Antolin, to justify the appealed decision, despite
the other evidence corroborating said testimony. Moreover, Simanero
could not possibly have testified on the motive of the assassins, an important
element that Antolin could and did supply, apart from
the circumstance that his cooperation made it possible for the prosecution to locate the
firearms used in the commission of the offense.
In short, the lower court was justified in discharging Antolin from the information in the case for multiple
murder.
Regarding the credibility of his testimony as a state witness,
suffice it to say that its veracity has been amply established, not only because
it was substantially corroborated by Simanero’s
testimony, but, also, by the fact that the firearms used by appellants were
recovered through the assistance of Antolin, that
personal effects belonging to appellants were found in the foxholes at the scene
of the occurrence, and that the other evidence on record bear out the
aforementioned testimony of Antolin.
It is true that, testifying subsequently for the defense, Antolin claimed to know nothing about the circumstances
under which the Fontanillas had been killed, because
he was then, he claimed, in his house.
In this connection, however, the decision appealed from has the following
to say:
“x x x Altho Obdiy-ya Antolin, as a defense witness, tried to repudiate his
testimony as a State witness, by stating that he did not know who ambushed and
killed the Fontanillas and that the facts testified
to by him as a State witness were taught to him by Sgt. Esteban of the 120th PC
Company, this Court can not believe this testimony of Obdiy-ya
Antolin, as a defense witness, not only because of
his manner in so testifying, – very hesitant, with bowed head towards the floor as if he could not squarely face
the Court, under heavy strain and wary, – which was a direct contrast from his
manner when he testified for the State, – alert, quick and confident, – but
also because the essential details of his testimony as a State witness could
not have been taught to him by Sgt. Esteban.
In fact, Antolin’s revelations to Capt. Panis led to the recovery of the firearms used by the
accused in the ambuscade from the hiding place in Dibibi
forest and to the quick solution of the mystery of the ambuscade of the Fontanillas. Besides, the essential details of Antolin’s testimony as a State witness and of the lone
survivor (Simanero) as regards the ambush and the
individual participation of the accused are sustained by the respective
confessions of Catalino Santos (Exhs. ‘N’ and ‘O’), Pablo Basilio
(Exh. ‘P’), Tabbegat Bocto (Exh. ‘Q’), and Singgup Olmehemet (Ex. ‘R’), wherein they admitted their individual
participation in the ambuscade, and stated the motive – the clearing and
working of the land in Dinatay by the Fontanillas, which are claimed by the Ilongots
to be theirs, and the tribal belief or tradition
‘ponyang‘ (killing of people to cure sick Ilongots).”
Under the circumstances, we are not justified in disturbing the
conclusion thus reached by His Honor the trial Judge, who was in a better
position than we are to pass upon the veracity of the witnesses in this case.
Appellants, likewise, impugn the testimony of Simanero
as biased and prejudiced, because he is related to the Fontanillas
and his testimony is “clearly motivated by hatred,” in the language
of defense counsel. It should be noted,
that this alleged hatred is attributed, not to any personal animosity towards
appellants, but to Simanero’s consuming desire to
punish the murderers. This suggests,
however, his earnest conviction that appellants herein are the true culprits,
for, otherwise, instead of satisfying said desire, his testimony would defeat
it by promoting the conviction of innocent parties, thus, in effect,
exonerating the guilty ones. In other
words, the indications are to the effect that Simanero
had really witnessed the occurrence.
Indeed, upon being investigated the next day, Simanero
stated positively that the Fontanillas had been
killed by Ilongots, whom he could identify if he saw
them again, and, when, immediately thereafter, he was brought to the place
where Ilongots had been rounded up, he unhesitatingly singled out herein
appellants and Antolin as the culprits, and they, in turn, admitted their guilt.
Appellants would have us
believe that their confessions had been secured through duress, but, the
testimony of the Justice of the Peace before whom said confessions were
subscribed and sworn to, the firm hands with which[1]
they had apparently subscribed said confessions, and the many details set forth therein,[2]
which could have been supplied by no
other person than appellants themselves,[3] leave no room for doubt as to the absence of
said duress.
It is apparent from the foregoing that the lower court has not
erred in finding appellants herein guilty of multiple murder, as charged in
the information in G.R. No. L-17217.
Although the penalty meted out to them is in accordance with law, the
number of votes necessary to sanction the extreme penalty imposed upon Catalino Santos is lacking, he having committed the
offense to forestall, he believed, a usurpation of rights he felt morally
bound to defend. Indeed, Santos
was regarded as a leader of the Ilongots, for he had
had some schooling, and was, at one time, a public officer, although he had not
gone beyond the elementary education.
Precisely, because of the limited nature of his schooling and of the
effect, upon his general outlook,
of the unenlightened environment prevailing in the community of Ilongots to which he belongs, as well as of the circumstance that the deceased Flaviano Fontanilla had been a
former municipal mayor, whose act in clearing and working on a land claimed by
the llongots was seemingly regarded by these non-Christians as one of oppression
and abuse of authority, the Court feels that Santos should not be dealt with the severity due to
persons otherwise circumstanced. Hence,
the penalties imposed upon him should be reduced to three (3) life imprisonments,
subject to the limitations prescribed in Article 70 of the Revised Penal Code.
With respect to cases G.R. Nos. L-17215 and L-17216, it is clear
that the testimony of the witnesses for the prosecution, corroborated by the
confessions above referred to and the other circumstances already adverted to, deserves more credence and has
much more weight than the absolutely uncorroborated testimony of appellants
Santos and Bocto, who, like their codefendants, Basilio and Olmehemet, have
limited themselves to merely denying the acts imputed to them by the
prosecution.
Modified as regards the penalties for Catalino
Santos in G.R. No. L-17217, which are hereby reduced to three (3) life
imprisonments, the decision appealed
from is, accordingly, affirmed in all other respects, with costs against
the appellants.
IT IS SO ORDERED.
Reyes, Dizon, Regala,
Makalintal, Bengzon, Zaldivar Sanchez and
Ruiz Castro, JJ., concur.
[1]
Judging from their signatures thereon.
[2]
Most of which were later confirmed.
[3]
Despite their testimony to the contrary.