THE PEOPLE OF THE PHILIPPINES, PLAINTIFF AND APPELLEE, VS. VIVENCIO CATLI, DEFENDANT AND APPELLANT.

This case began with an information against Vivencio Catli charging that
sometime in May 1948, in Tiaong, Quezon Province, he inflicted mortal injuries
upon Vidal Saludo, assisted by two others still at large. Aggravating
circumstances of treachery, superior strength and means to weaken the defense
were cited.

After trial, the court of first instance of Quezon adjudged him guilty of
murder, and sentenced him to suffer life imprisonment with the accessories, to
indemnify Saludo’s heirs in the sum of P6,000.00 sans subsidiary imprisonment,
and to defray the costs.

Insisting on his innocence, the accused seasonably appealed, raising here
these material points: (a) substantial variance between the allegations and the
proof, because while the information indicated three persons as authors of the
crime, the prosecution’s evidence showed there were more; (b) delay of seven
years in the prosecution of the crime; (c) the testimonies of the State
witnesses are evidently fabricated.

The people’s evidence discloses that on May 6, 1943, Vidal Saludo, then
barrio lieutenant of Bucal, Tiaong, was living with his wife, Fausta Mercado,
their children and a 14-year old godson Francisco Lopez, in a house located in
said barrio. At about 7:00 a.m. of said day, several armed men headed by
appellant Vivencio Catli inquired from Fausta Mercado the whereabouts of her
husband, and upon being informed that the latter was upstairs, Catli went up and
requested Vidal Saludo to accompany him to look for Benito Tenorio who had
strayed from the appellant’s group; yielding to this request, Saludo joined the
appellant’s band iwhich proceeded westward; Saludo was then wearing rubber
shoes, white polo shirt and fatigue pants. And that was the last time his family
saw him.

At around 11:00 o’clock of that same morning, Marcelo Verano, who was
pasturing his carabao in the northern part of barrio Bucal, heard someone
groaning; out of curiosity, he proceeded to the place whence the sounds had
come, cautiously peered through some bushes and espied appellant beating Vidal
Saludo with a rice pestle, in the presence of armed companions, one of whom
remarked: “That is enough Babing, he is already dead;” seized With fear, Verano
left the place but refrained from disclosing to others what he had observed,
because he surmised that appellant and his men were Huks.

At about 2:00 p.m. of the same day, Diego Martija, then a member of the rural
council of Bucal, met Maria Saludo who sobbingly told him that her brother Vidal
had been taken by the Huks led by appellant; she begged his help to locate
Vidal, and after some hesitation, Martija responded by asking a neighbor,
Leoncio Manimtim to accompany him to search for Vidal. The pair followed the
trail Vidal was last seen to have taken, making inquiries from people who may
have seen Saludo’s group; the search ended near the Capanglao river; en route,
the two, Martija and Manimtim discovered some drops of blood. As they approached
the river, the two found a newly dug grave covered with coconut leaves; they
brushed off the leaves only to find a castorillo hat which they recognized as
one Vidal Saludo was wont to wear. Replacing the coconut leaves, the two
left for their respective homes, but refrained from revealing their findings to
the authorities, for fear of the Huks.

Years after or in 1951, Diego Martija was appointed barrio lieutenant of
Bucal but he was not provided with firearms; then on March 22, 1955, he was
named chief of the civilian commando unit of the same barrio and was given a
gun. Emboldened by the possession of such weapon and encouraged by the
government campaign against the dissidents, Martija sometime in December, 1955,
reported to the police chief of Tiaong what he knew about Vidal Saludo’s
killing. On December 5, 1955, the police chief with some PC soldiers exhumed the
remains of Vidal Saludo; inside the grave, which he pointed out, they found
bones of a human skeleton and a pair of soles of rubber shoes. The bones were
gathered in an army sack, shipped to the NBI in Manila for medico-legal
examination, and following such examination, Dr. Jesus D. Crisostomo,
medico-legal officer submitted an osteological report with the conclusion
that:

	“1.	Those bony remains are human in origin.
	2.	They belong to only one individual.
	3.	That the set of bones belongs to a male individual.
	4.	That this individual has a stature of approximately 165.812 cms. (5 feet-5 inches) plus or minus.
	5.	That the probable age of time of death of this individual may lie between 35 and 45 years.
	6.	That no cause of death can be assigned or given in this particular individual, as the submitted and assorted bones as a set does not show any sign of antemortem injury.
	7.	That considering the moderately advanced postmortem disintegration of the bones submitted (sorted and non-sorted), the probable length of time that may have already elapsed after burial may be placed between five (5) and ten (10) years.”

Appellants defense revolyes around an alibi. He testified that in 1946, he
lived in the house of Arcadio Exconde in barrio Quipot, Tiaong; that in March
1948, he moved to barrio “Sta. Clara, Sto, Tomas, Batangas, residing in the
house of Elena Jaurigue, sister of Gorgonia, the girl he was courting; that
following an old native custom, he stayed in Sta. Clara performing such chores
as drawing water and clearing the coffee farm in the service of the woman,
object of his affections; that he never left Sta. Clara until July 1948 when,
having ostensively won the girl’s favor, he and his bride-to-be departed for
barrio Quipot, Tiaong, where they resided in peace arid contentment. He recounts
that on April 6, 1951, five men lured him from his house at wight and after
leading him some five meters away, they stabbed him repeatedly and then left”
him for dead; that fifteen days after, he recovered from his wounds at the
government hospital of San Pablo City and then he moved to Unisan, Quezon for
fear of his assailants; that on April 11, 1955, he executed an affidavit before
Agent No. 43 of the National Bureau of Investigation regarding the attempt on
his life, naming as his assailants Tomas Magwari, Hilarion Gutierrez, Pedro
Mangubat, Eusebio Orense and another person whom he failed to recognize and
especially pointing to Mayor Punzalan of Tiaong as the instigator of the crime;
that on July 1, 1955, he executed another affidavit concerning the same incident
before Jose B. Tuason, deputy clerk of the CFI of Quezon and on the basis of the
two affidavits, a complaint for frustrated murder filed by appellant before the
assistant fiscal of Quezon was investigated. Appellant also averred that while
his complaint was pending investigation, Mayor Punzalan sent an emissary,
Avelino by name, requesting him (appellant) to withdraw his complaint in
exchange for P3,000.00 and an appointment as a caminero; that appellant
spurned the offer and instead, on September 1, 1955, he executed another
affidavit before the same NBI Agent No. 43 elaborating on his first affidavit;
that on December 5, 1955, the police chief of Tiaong directed the exhumation of
Saludo’s remains; that on Decemeber 13, 1955, the same officer fetched Fausta
Mercado from barrio Bangcalat, Tanauan, Batangas and took her to Tiaong where
she subscribed to a statement naming the appellant as the murderer of her
husband Vidal Saludo; and that the complaint against him was trumped up at the
instigation of Mayor Punzalan because of his refusal to withdraw his complaint
against the mayor and the latter’s henchmen.

Appellant’s alibi, besides being inherently weak, sounds unconvincing and
ineffectual. His claim that he resided in his sister-in-law’s (Elena Jaurigue)
house at barrio Sta. Elena, Sto. Tomas, Batangas between March and July 1948, by
no means erases the possibility that he was in barrio Bucal, Tiaong on May 6,
1948, when the victim, Vidal Saludo was murdered. Elena Jaurigue herself
declared that the distance between the two barrios was short and could be
negotiated by bus in half an hour. Although she tried hard to corroborate
appellant’s alibi by insisting that the latter did not leave barrio Sta. Elena
even once during the five months of his stay thereat, her testimony does not
ring true. She said it was impossible for appellant to leave her house without
her knowledge; because her home was a one-room affair where appellant kept his
clothes and that this room was under Jock, the key to which she always kept. But
this situation does not rule out appellant’s chance to slip out of the premises
unnoticed by Elena, because precisely he was locked out; and since he was
purportedly rendering manual chores, he perforce had to be dressed and leave the
house once in a while, such as appellant would stay confined in only one place
Withal, it is hard to believe that an able-bodied laborer for a prolonged and
continuous period.

As against appellant’s alibi, there is the positive identification made of
him by Marcelo Verano who peered through the bushes and saw him clubbing Vidal
Saludo with a rice pestle; and the testimony of the victim’s wife pointing to
appellant as the leader of the band that took her husband away. All these render
appellant’s alibi, unavailing.^[1]

In connection with the variance between the number of persons alleged in the
information and the number of persons cited by the witnesses as having
participated in the crime, it is enough to state that such variance is not
material. Appellant was properly identified in both the information and in the
testimonial evidence of the witnesses; he was fully aware of the nature and
cause of the accusation; and he failed to object seasonably in the trial to the
testimonial allegation that there were some other persons involved in the crime.
And it is the rule in this jurisdiction that a “variance between the allegations
of the information and the evidence offered by the prosecution in support
thereof, does not of itself entitle the accused to an acquittal.”^[2] More, it is within the prosecution
officer’s discretion to determine what persons appear to be responsible for the
commission of an offense; and if for lack of knowledge or mistake or any other
reason, he fails to include the names of one or more criminals in an
information, such persons will not be relieved of penal liability; nor will the
acctised who have been charged with the offense, be permitted to escape
punishment merely because it develops in the course of the trial that there were
other guilty participants in the crime.^[3]

Appellant ascribes unreasonableness in the delay between the supposed
commission of the offense in 1948 to its prosecution in 1956. It appears,
however, that the silence of the witnesses, particularly of Martija, Verano and
Fausta Mercado was satisfactorily explained: they feared Huk reprisals. Indeed
before these witnesses disclosed the facts to the authorities, dissident bands
asking for “binalut” or wrappers with food had been foraging in the barrios and
intimidating the residents. The insecurity of the life in the barrio is
illustrated by appellant’s claim that he was stabbed and left for dead on April
6, 1951 when he refused to give his firearm to six persons.

Appellant lastly asserts that the charge against him was trumped up and the
witness’s testimonies fabricated. He claims that he was stabbed on April 6, 1951
upon orders of Mayor Punzalan; that as a consequence, he filed a complaint for
frustrated murder against the Mayor and his five henchmen; and for his refusal
to withdraw the charge, the mayor caused the instant case to be filed against
him.

Appellant’s claim lacks merit. His written statement (Exh. H, p. 190 record)
of April 7, 1951, when he still had no opportunity to contrive, reveals that he
failed to recognize his assailants. This statement entitled “Ante-Mortem” bears
the appellant’s thumbmark and is witnessed by his own brother-in-law, Simon
Jaurigue. Subsequently, on April 11, 1951, five days after he was stabbed,
appellant executed an affidavit before Agent No. 43 of the NBI and this time, he
named Hilarion Gutierrez, Tomas Magwari, Pedro Mangubat and Eustaquio Orense as
his attackers; he also claimed having overheard Gutierrez mutter: “Ang sabi ni
Mayor (PUNZALAN) ay huag ng barilin at saksakin na lamang” (Exh. 6, pp. 178-179,
Record). In the same statement, however, appellant stated that one Brigido
Balmes aided him shortly after he was wounded; but in the trial, Balmes
testifying as a rebuttal witness for the State declared that appellant had told
him that five persons had attacked and stabbed him near a mango tree but that he
(appellant) was unable to recognize his attackers.

In fine, we feel that the evidence on hand sufficiently establishes
appellant’s guilt beyond reasonable doubt.

Wherefore, the judgment of conviction must be upheld; and there being no
question as to the penalty imposed upon this appellant, the appealed decision is
affirmed in toto with costs. So ordered.

Padilla, Bautista Angelo, Labrador, Concepcion, Reyes, J. B. L., Barrera,
Paredes, Dizon, Regala, and Makalintal, JJ., concur.

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[1] People vs. Estacio, et al., 106 Phil., 981;
People vs. Sedenio, G.R. No. L-6372, April 29, 1954.

[2] U.S. vs. Stataoa Bungaoil, 34 Phil. 837;
citing U.S. vs. Dichao, 27 Phil. 421, and Ledbetter vs. U.S., 170 US 606, 42 L.
ed.

[3] U.S. vs. Abanzado, 37 Phil. 658.