PEOPLE OF THE PHILIPPINES, PETITIONER, VS. HON. RICARDO D. GALANO, PRESIDING JUDGE, COURT OF FIRST INSTANCE OF MANILA, BRANCH XIII, AND GREGORIO SANTOS, RESPONDENTS.

The Court sets aside the respondent judge’s orders dismissing the
information for estafa against respondent accused,
since the offense charged clearly has not prescribed.  The complaint filed with the Batangas court which expressly alleged commission of the
offense within the municipality and which pended for twelve years (the accused
having jumped bail and evaded rearrest for nine
years) and which was eventually dismissed by said court for lack of territorial
jurisdiction as a result of the proof adduced before it properly interrupted
and tolled the prescription period. 
Respondent judge failed, in ruling otherwise, to apply the settled rule
that the jurisdiction of a court is determined in criminal cases by the
allegations of the complaint or information and not by the result of
proof.  The case is ordered remanded for
determination with the utmost dis­patch, since this case has already been
pending for fifteen years owing to respondent accused’s
deplorable tactics.

The undisputed factual background of the case is succinctly
stated by then Acting Solicitor General, now Associate Justice of the Court of
Appeals, Hugo E. Gutierrez, Jr., thus:

“1. On October 2,
1962, a criminal complaint for estafa was
filed in the municipal court of Batangas, Batangas (now City Court of Batangas
City) against the accused-respondent Gregorio Santos by complainant, Juanito Limbo, x x x.

“2. Gregorio Santos
was arrested to answer for the above charge, and upon his arrest, posted a bail
bond for his provisional liberty.  The
accused was thereafter arraigned and he pleaded not guilty to the
charge.  Then, the case was heard on its
merits.  However, on September 16, 1964, the accused jumped bail.  As a result, his bail bond was forfeited and
the case against him archived by the municipal court of Batangas,
Batangas.

“3.  It was not until September 14, 1973, about nine years later, when
the accused was rearrested, and the trial of the said case resumed.

“4.  On October
21, 1974, while the said case was pending trial, private respondent
Gregorio Santos filed a motion to dismiss the case on the ground that the Batangas court did not have territorial jurisdiction over
the case, the evidence showing that the crime was committed in Manila.

“5. Finding the
motion meritorious, the Batangas City Court issued an
order dated November 5, 1974, dismissing the case against Gregorio Santos for
lack of territorial jurisdiction over the crime charged, x x x.

“6.  On November
14, 1974, the complainant Juanito B.
Limbo re-filed the same case against Gregorio Santos in the Fiscal’s
Office of Manila.  A preliminary investigation
was conducted.  On July 29, 1975, the
corresponding information was filed with the Court of First Instance of Manila,
docketed as Criminal Case No. 22397, x x x.

“7. On November 12, 1975 the accused
Gregorio Santos filed a motion to dismiss Criminal Case No. 22397 on the
grounds of prescription and double jeopardy.

“8. The prosecuting
fiscal filed his opposition to said motion on December 2, 1975, to which the accused filed a rejoinder
on December 5, 1975.

“9. December 8,
1975, the Court of First Instance of Manila, Branch XIII, presided over by the
Honorable Ricardo D. Galano, issued an order
dismissing Criminal Case No. 22397 on the ground that the offense charged had
already prescribed, x x x.  The prosecution moved for the reconsideration
of said order but this was denied by the lower court by order of January 7, 1976.  x x x

“10. From the
said Order of dismissal, the City Fiscal of Manila interposed an appeal by certiorari
to this Honorable Court on January 24,
1976.  On March 3, 1976, this Honorable Court
issued the Resolution of March 3, 1976
requiring the Solicitor General to file the required petition for review within
fifteen days from receipt thereof.  x x x.”

The People avers in the petition^[1]
that respondent judge gravely erred “in dismissing Criminal Case No. 22397
despite the provisions of Article 91 of the Revised Penal Code, which clearly
indicate that the offense charged has not prescribed” and “in not considering
the prevailing jurisprudence indicating non-prescription of the offense
charged, and in holding that the case of People v. Olarte,
19 SCRA 494, does not apply to the case at bar.”

The petition is patently meritorious and must be granted.

I. The offense of estafa for which
respondent accused stands charged clearly has not prescribed.

Article 91 of the Revised Penal Code on prescription of offenses
provides:

“Art. 91.  Computation
of prescription of offenses.  – The period
of prescription shall commence to run from the day on which the crime is dis­covered
by the offended party, the authorities, or by their agents, and shall be
interrupted by the filing of the complaint or information, and shall commence
to run again when the proceedings terminate without the accused being convicted
or acquitted, or are unjustifiably stopped for any reason not imputable to
him.  x x x“

The offense was committed on or about September 16, 1962 when
respondent failed to account for and instead misappropriated to his own use the
sum of P8,704.00 representing the net proceeds (minus his commission) of 272
booklets of sweepstakes tickets that had been entrusted to him by the
complainant, who promptly filed on October 2, 1962 plainly within the ten-year
prescriptive period the criminal complaint against respondent accused in the
Municipal Court of Batangas, Batangas.  The prescriptive period was thereupon interrupted.

After his plea of not guilty and during the trial, respondent
accused jumped bail in September, 1964 and evaded rearrest
for nine years until September, 1973 and the trial was resumed.  When the Batangas
court in its Order of November 5, 1974 upon respondent’s motion dismissed the
complaint “for lack of jurisdiction” since the evidence (of both
prosecution and accused) showed that all elements of the crime were committed
in Manila (and not in Ba­tangas),^[2]
the proceedings therein terminated without conviction or acquittal of
respondent accused and it was only then that the prescriptive period (which was
interrupted during the pendency of the case in the Batangas court) commenced to run again.

When the City Fiscal of Manila upon complainant’s instance refiled on July 29, 1975 the same case against respondent
accused in the Manila court of first instance, (after having conducted a preliminary
investigation), it is clear that not even a year of the ten-year prescriptive
period had been consumed.

Respondent accused intent on thwarting his prosecution filed anew
a motion to dismiss the information on grounds of prescription and double
jeopardy.

There is manifestly no jeopardy, because he was not acquitted by
the Batangas court which on the basis of the evidence
could neither convict him because it was thereby shown to have no jurisdiction
over the offense.

But respondent judge gravely erred in sustaining the ground of
prescription, ruling that there was no interruption of the prescriptive period
during the pendency of the case in the Batangas court because “(T)he proceedings contemplated
by Article 91 are proceedings which are valid and before a competent
court.  If they are void from the
beginning because the court has no territorial jurisdiction of the offense
charged, it is as if no proceedings were held thereat.  If this is so, then the warrant or order of
arrest as well as the bail given by the accused for his provisional liberty is
of no effect.  Inevitably, there can be
no jumping bail to speak of and there are no proceedings to be
interrupted.”^[3]

This is plain error for “Settled is the rule . . . . that
the jurisdiction of a court is determined in criminal cases by the allegations
of the complaint or information and not by the result of proof.”^[4]

It follows clearly that the Batangas court was vested with lawful jurisdiction over the
criminal complaint filed with it which expressly alleged that the offense was
committed “in the Municipality of Batangas,
province of Batangas” and that the proceedings
therein were valid and before a competent court, (including the arrest warrant,
the grant of bail and forfeiture thereof upon the accused’s
jumping of bail), until the same court issued its November, 1974 order
dismissing the case and declaring itself without territorial
jurisdiction on the basis of the evidence presented to it by both prosecution
and the accused.

It follows just as clearly that the prescriptive period was interrupted
and tolled during the 12-year pendency of the
proceedings before the Batangas Court (for nine years
of which respondent accused had jumped bail and evaded rearrest).

II.  Respondent judge
gravely erred in dismissing the information on the ground of prescription and
disregarding the controlling case of People vs. Olarte.^[5]

In the second People vs. Olarte
case,^[6]
the Court clarified precisely for the guidance of bench and bar that the true
doctrine is that the filing of the complaint in the municipal court, even if it
be merely for purposes of preliminary investigation (where the offense charged
is beyond its jurisdiction to try the case on the merits) should, and does
interrupt the period of prescription, as follows:

“Analysis of the precedents on the issue of prescription
discloses that there are two lines of decisions following differing criteria in
determining whether prescription of crimes has been interrupted.  One line of precedents holds that the filing
of the complaint with the justice of the peace (or municipal judge) does
interrupt the course of the prescriptive term: 
(People vs. Olarte, L-13027, June 30, 1960 and
cases cited therein; People vs. Uba, L-13106, October
16, 1959; People vs. Aquino, 68 Phil. 588, 590.)
Another series of decisions declares that to produce interruption the complaint
or information must have been filed in the proper court that has jurisdiction
to try the case on its merits:  People
vs. Del Rosario, L-15140, December
29, 1960; People vs. Coquia, L-15456, June 29, 1963.

“In view of this diversity of precedents, and in order to
provide guidance for Bench and Bar, this Court has reexamined the question and,
after mature consideration has arrived at the conclusion that the true
doctrine is, and should be, the one established by the decision holding
that the filing of the complaint in the Municipal Court, even if it be
merely for purposes of preliminary examination or investigation, should,
and does, interrupt the period of prescription of the criminal
responsibility, even if the court where the complaint or information is
filed can not try the case on its merits. 
Several reasons buttress this conclusion:  first, the text of Article 91 of the Revised
Penal Code, in declaring that the period of prescription ‘shall be interrupted
by the filing of the complaint or information’ without distinguishing whether
the complaint is filed in the court for preliminary examination or
investigation merely, or for action on the merits.  Second, even if the court where the complaint
or information is filed may only proceed to investigate the case, its actuation
already represents the initial step of the proceedings against the
offender.  Third, it is unjust to deprive
the injured party of the right to obtain vindication on account of delays that
are not under his control.  All that the
victim of the offense may do on his part to initiate the prosecution is to file
the requisite complaint.”^[7]

Respondent judge in his dismissal order correctly cited the
rationale for statutory prescriptions, inter alia,
that “the delay in instituting the proceedings not only causes expenses to
the State, but exposes public justice to peril, for it weakens oral evidence,
due to the lapse of the natural period of duration of memory, if not to anything
else.  And it is the policy of the law
that prosecutions should be prompt and that statutes enforcing that promptitude
should be maintained, they being not merely acts of grace, but checks imposed
by the State upon its subalterns, to exact vigilant activity and to secure for
criminal trials the best evidence that can be obtained.”^[8]

But respondent judge fell into grave error in not applying the
controlling case of Olarte on his
misconception that there had been no valid complaint filed with a competent
court in Batangas contrary to what has already been
held hereinabove that the express allegations of the complaint that the offense
was committed in Batangas vested the Batangas court with lawful jurisdiction until its
dismissal order twelve years later for lack of jurisdiction as a result of the proof
presented before it during the trial, (and in not taking into account that the
delay was not at all due to the State but to respondent accused himself who
jumped bail and escaped the law for nine [9] years and who apparently has made
no effort all this time to make good the amount due to complainant or any part
thereof).

Since the record with transcript of the testimonial evidence in
the Batangas court is complete (and shows that the
trial was continued on August 2, 1974 to September 10, 1974 while respondent
accused was testifying on the witness stand but that he instead filed his
motion to dismiss of October 14, 1974 which was granted by the Batangas court for lack of territorial jurisdiction) and
this case has already been pending for almost 15 years, all the evidence
already taken by the Batangas court as recorded in
the minutes and transcript shall be deemed reproduced upon remand of the case
to the Manila court which is hereby ordered to receive only the remaining
evidence of the respondent accused and such rebuttal evidence as the parties
may have and thereafter resolve the case with the utmost dispatch.

ACCORDINGLY, respondent judge’s dismissal orders of
December 8, 1975 and January 7, 1976 are hereby set aside, and the case is
remanded to respondent judge or whoever presides Branch XIII of the Manila
court of first instance for continuation of the trial (with reproduction of the
evidence in the Batangas city court in Criminal Case
No. 532 thereof, entitled “People vs. Gregorio Santos”) in line with
the directives in the preceding paragraph. 
Respondent judge or the judge presiding his court is further ordered to
report to this Court the action taken hereon within a period of ninety (90)
days from promulgation of this decision. 
In view of the many years that the criminal case has been pending, this
decision is declared immediately executory upon
promulgation.  SO ORDERED.

Makasiar, Muñoz
Palma, Concepcion, Jr., and
Martin, JJ., concur.

^[1]
Admitted upon motion of September 30,
1976 of the Solicitor General’s office after it withdrew an earlier
manifestation of April 23, 1976
erroneously sharing respondent judge’s wrong premises and conclusions.

^[2] The
pertinent portion of the Batangas court’s dis­missal
order reads thus:

“The records show that by a
great preponderance of evidence, the offense of estafa,
as alleged in the Criminal Com­plaint herein dated October 2, 1962, and signed
by the complaining witness, was com­mitted, if at all, in the City of
Manila.  Even the affidavit of said
complainant dated October 2, 1962, and attached to the records as page 2
thereof, states in part as follows: 
‘that from July 20, 1962 to August 24, 1962 in my capacity as general
agent of the Philippine Charity Sweepstakes, I delivered to my sub-agent
Gregorio Santos of 1002 Metrica, Sampaloc,
Manila, two hundred seventy two (272) booklets, sweepstakes tickets of the
total value of P10,880.00 to be sold by him on commission and the proceeds of
the sale thereof to be turned over to me on or before the date of the draw,
September 16, 1962.’ Nowhere does it appear that the receipt of the tickets, or
any of them, was effected in Batangas
City (then Batangas,
Batangas), nor was the delivery of the pro­ceeds of
the sale to be made in said place, nor was the supposed defraudation
committed therein.”

^[3]
Resolution denying the People’s motion for reconsideration, Rollo,
p. 75.

^[4]
People vs. Delfin, 2 SCRA 911, 920 (1961) per
Reyes, J.B.L., J.

^[5]
19 SCRA 495 (1967), per Reyes, J.B.L., J.

^[6] Supra,
the first case having been decided on June
30, 1960, 108 Phil. 756 (L-13027).

^[7]
Emphasis supplied.

^[8]
Dismissal order, Rollo, pp. 69-70.