G.R. No. L-39746. September 27, 1983
THE PEOPLE OF THE PHILIPPINES, PLAINTIFF-APPELLEE, VS. BLANDINO SAN MIGUEL Y BELGAR, ALIAS “EDUARDO MENDEZ Y BELGAR”, PETER DOE, ALIAS “ALBERT ADIN, JR.”, JOHN DOE ALIAS “BALUT”…
ABAD SANTOS, J.:
In Criminal Case No. Q-3378 of the defunct Court of First
Instance of Rizal, BLANDINO SAN MIGUEL, ALBERT ADIN,
JR. and JOHN DOE alias BALUT were accused of homicide in an information which
reads as follows:
“That on or about the 2nd day of October, 1972, in Quezon City, Philippines, the above-named
accused, conspiring together, confederating with and mutually helping one
another, did, then and there, wilfully, unlawfully
and feloniously with intent to kill and without
any justifiable motive, attack, assault
and employ personal violence upon the person of one LUIS TARUM Y BINAG by then
and there stabbing him, thereby inflicting upon him serious and mortal wounds which was the direct and immediate
cause of his death, to the damage and prejudice of the heirs of said Luis Tarum y Binag, in such amount as
may be awarded to them under the provisions of the Civil Code.” (Expediente, p. 1.)
Only Blandino was arrested and
tried. The trial court pronounced the
following sentence:
“WHEREFORE, the Court finds the defendant Blandino
San Miguel guilty beyond reasonable doubt of the crime of Murder and although
there is one aggravating circumstance of treachery without any mitigating
circumstance to offset the same, the Court hereby merely imposes a penalty of
RECLUSION PERPETUA instead of DEATH.
“The Court hereby further sentences the defendant Blandino San Miguel to pay to the heirs of the deceased
P12,000.00 as indemnity for the death of Luis Tarum,
P10,000.00 as moral damages, and P99,360.00 as loss of earning, without any
subsidiary liability in case of insolvency, and to pay one-third of the
costs.” (Expediente, pp. 49-50.)
Under consideration is the appeal of Blandino
from the foregoing judgment.
The evidence for the prosecution as summarized by the trial court is as follows:
“At about 6:00 o’clock on the morning of October 2, 1972, Luis
Tarum was sleeping under a mosquito net inside his
house located at the squatter’s area at 7th Street, Broadway, Quezon City. His
wife Lolita Tarum was in front of the stairway. Suddenly the three defendants arrived. One of them, Junior, went up the house. He suddenly stabbed Luis Tarum
and dragged him outside the house where the two other defendants Blandino San Miguel and “Balut”
were waiting. The three defendants
simultaneously attacked Luis Tarum with a club and
bladed weapons. Blandino
San Miguel stabbed Luis Tarum three times and also
clubbed him three times at the back of his neck with an iron pipe three feet
long and one inch in diameter. One of
the stab wounds inflicted by Blandino San Miguel
landed above the heart. While Blandino San Miguel was clubbing Luis Tarum,
Junior and Balut were also simultaneously stabbing
him. During the attack “Balut” said:
“Nobody must interfere!”
“After inflicting several wounds on Luis Tarum
all the defendants ran away together.
Lolita Tarum, wife of Luis Tarum,
brought her husband to the hospital, but Luis Tarum
died before he arrived at the hospital.
All in all the deceased received nine stab wounds, and abrasions and
other incised wounds found by Dr. Prospero Cabanayan,
who conducted a postmortem examination of the deceased. (Exhibit “A”). The cause of death was ‘hemorrhage, severe,
secondary to stab wounds, multiple’.
(Exhibit “A-1”).
“At the time of his death Luis Tarum
was in good health, earning P7.50 a day as security guard and he used to
deliver every fifteen days to his wife the amount of P115.00.” (Expediente, pp. 42-43.)
Upon the other hand, Blandino who
testified alone in his defense claimed that:
“At about 6:00 o’clock on the morning of October 2, 1972, he (Blandino San Miguel) went to the house of Junior to ask
whether the latter would be reporting for work.
Junior did not answer but instead he went down from their house and went
to the house of Pedring which is only a few meters
away. After a while, Junior went out of
the house of Pedring carrying with him a bolo. After arming himself with a bolo, which he
took from the house of Pedring, Junior went next to the house of another neighbor,
Luis Tarum y Binag. Blandino San Miguel
followed Junior but stayed only at the door of the house. Suddenly, Blandino
San Miguel heard a commotion inside the house of Luis Tarum. After sometime Junior fell downstairs from
the house of Luis Tarum. Luis Tarum followed
him downstairs with a bolo in his hand.
When Luis Tarum reached the ground he boloed Junior who was not hurt because he could parry the
blow. Then Luis Tarum and Junior grappled for the
bolo. While they were grappling for the
possession of the bolo the wife of Luis Tarum asked Blandino San Miguel to pacify them. So Blandino went
near them and called to Luis Tarum: ‘That
is enough. That is enough.’
“Apparently, Luis was startled by the voice of Blandino San Miguel and so he began attacking the latter
with his bolo. Blandino
was not hit because he ran and
sought cover under a neighboring house where he got hold of a pipe and then
returned to Luis Tarum. When Blandino
emerged from under the house Luis Tarum again
attacked Blandino with a bolo which the latter parried.
After parrying the blow Blandino struck Luis Tarum with the iron pipe.
But Luis Tarum persisted in attacking Blandino who
thereupon inflicted a second blow on the neck of Luis Tarum, who thereafter felt groggy and proceeded in a weak condition
to his house. On the way to his house
“Balut“, who is a brother of Junior stabbed
Luis, who immediately fell upon receiving the stab wound. Then “Balut”
picked up Luis Tarum’s bolo which had fallen to the
ground and gave it to Junior. Thereafter
“Balut” and Junior repeatedly stabbed Luis Tarum.
“According to Blandino San Miguel,
he immediately instructed the wife of Luis Tarum to
call the police. Then he went to a Metrocom officer’s house to report the incident.” (Expediente, pp. 43-44.)
The appellant admits having struck the deceased twice with an
iron pipe. But he claims that he did so
in self-defense. His claim is not
impressed with merit.
According to the appellant he started out as a peace-maker
between the deceased and Junior only to become one of the protagonists
afterwards. Here is his testimony:
“Q.
[Atty. Viterbo Tagarda]
What did you do while
you saw they were grappling for the bolo?
A
At that moment the wife of Luis was shouting and she was asking for help
and for me to pacify them.
Q What
did you do when you heard the wife of Luis calling for help?
A I
went near them and then I called Luis, saying, that is enough, that is enough.
Q And
when you said calling the attention of Luis, that is enough, that is enough,
what happened next?
A Maybe
he was a little bit surprised when I called him because I was quite near him
and he tried to strike me with the bolo which he got from Junior.
Q Were
you hit when Luis Tarum struck you with the bolo?
A No,
sir, I was able to retreat and went inside the house.
Q After
you retreated, what did you do?
A I
was able to get hold of a pipe under the house.
Court:
Whose house was that
where you got a pipe?
A I
do not know, sir.
Atty. Tagarda:
Q Then
after that, after holding that pipe, what did you do?
A I
went out, sir, from under the house.
Q After
going out from under the house, what happened next?
A He
boloed me again.
Q Were
you hit?
A No, sir, I was able to parry it. So I hit him at the head. (Witness indicating).
Interpreter:
The witness
indicating the back of his head.
Q When
you hit him at his head, what happened next?
A None,
sir. When I hit him on the head, after
hitting him on the head he faced me again, and struck me again. At that moment I again hit him.
Q Where was the second blow
land when you hit him?
A Here,
at the head, sir. (Witness
indicating).” (TSN, Sept. 25, 1974, pp. 2-3.)
If it is true that the deceased turned on the appellant, what the
latter should have done was simply to run and get away as far as possible. Instead, he got hold of a pipe, confronted
the deceased and struck him twice with the pipe. The circumstances do not paint a picture of
self-defense.
Upon the other hand, the trial court said, “after
considering all the facts and the circumstances of the case, as well as the
demeanor or the witnesses during the trial, [the court] is more inclined to
accept the version of Lolita Tarum, who was the lone
witness for the prosecution.” We have no reason to disturb this factual
finding of the court a quo which was in a better position to
appreciate the credibility of witnesses.
The appellant was charged with homicide only but the trial court
adjudged him guilty of murder. The
appellant complains with justification that the trial court treated him
harshly.
The trial court rationalized its action as follows:
“The legal question is:
What crime has been committed?
While treachery obviously attended the commission of the offense, it can
be taken into account only as a generic aggravating circumstance because it is
not alleged in the information.
“However, it will be observed that while in the information,
the fiscal designated the crime as Homicide, yet, the information alleges acts which
show that the defendants took advantage of superior strength and that the crime
was committed with the aid of armed men, circumstances which qualify the killing into Murder.
x x
x x
x x x x x
“In the opinion of the Court, the acts alleged in the information
sufficiently show that at least the defendants took advantage of superior
strength. The averment that the three
accused conspired together, confederated with and mutually
helped one another in inflicting the stab wounds sufficiently alleges the qualifying
circumstance of taking advantage of superior strength and that the killing was
done with the aid of armed men. To
sufficiently allege ‘abuse of superior strength,’ or ‘with the aid of armed
men,’ the information does not have to use the language of the statute. Different words or phrases equally describing
the same facts may be used.” (Expediente,
pp. 46-47.)
The People agree with the appellant. The People brief submits:
“The words ‘conspiring together, confederating with and
mutually helping one another’ contained in the information, simply convey the
allegation of conspiracy. Otherwise, as
the defense rightly argues, ‘every charge of conspiracy to commit homicide,
would result in a charge of murder’.
There should be some other allegation in the information showing that
the accuse did take advantage of superior strength and/or with the aid of armed
men.” (Brief, p. 9.)
The common opinion of the appellant and the appellee
has jurisprudential support in People vs. Bautista, L-23303, May 20, 1969,
28 SCRA 184, which held that if the circumstance of abuse of superior strength
is not alleged in the information, it may only be considered as a generic
aggravating circumstance in the imposition of the corresponding penalty. (See also People vs. Jovellano, L-32421, March 27, 1974, 56 SCRA
156.)
The trial court did not err when it concluded that there was
abuse of superiority. For as the People
say:
“Considering that three assailants, all armed with bladed
weapons, simultaneously and repeatedly stabbed and clubbed the defenseless
victim, the killing was thereby attended by the aggravating circumstances of
abuse of superior strength and with the aid of armed men.” (Brief, p. 8.)
Neither did the trial court err in awarding damages. The indemnity of P12,000.00 is
jurisprudential; the award of P10,000.00 as moral damages is justified by the
Civil Code; and the award of P99,360.00 for loss of earnings was arrived as
follows:
“With respect to the civil liability, it appears that at the
time of the death of Luis Tarum he was 25 years old,
and that he used to turn over to his wife the amount of P115.00 every fifteen
days or P230.00 a month. Had Luis Tarum not been killed by the defendants, his remaining life
expectancy is computed by the following formula: 2/3 (80 minus 25, which is the age of the
deceased at the time of his death), which gives 36 years as the remaining life
expectancy of the deceased. Thus, by his
untimely death, his family lost an expected earning in the amount of
P99,360.00. (Villa-Rey
vs. Court of Appeals, L-25499, February 18, 1970).” (Expediente,
p. 49.)
WHEREFORE, the judgment of the trial court is modified in
that the appellant shall be convicted for the crime of homicide only and sentenced to an indeterminate penalty
of eight (8) years of prision mayor,
as minimum, to eighteen (18) years of reclusion temporal,
as maximum. The appealed judgment
is affirmed in all other respects. Costs
against the appellant.
SO ORDERED.
Makasiar, (Chairman), Aquino, Concepcion, Jr.,
Guerrero, and Escolin,
JJ., concur.
De Castro, J., on sick leave.