PEOPLE OF THE PHILIPPINES, PLAINTIFF-APPELLEE, VS. ROLANDO MANLULU AND DANTE SAMSON, ACCUSED-APPELLANTS.

GERARDO ALFARO, a NARCOM agent, was stabbed and shot with his service pistol in a drinking
spree. He died in the hospital the
following day. His drinking partners,
Rolando Manlulu and Dante Samson, were haled to court for his violent death.

The prosecution charges that Manlulu and Samson conspired in the
murder of Agent Alfaro. The accused on
the other hand invoke self-defense. They also insist that the non-issuance of a search warrant and warrant
of arrest should nullify their arrest and consequently exclude from judicial
consideration the evidence thus obtained.

But the trial court was not convinced. It found accused Dante Samson and Rolando Manlulu “guilty
beyond reasonable doubt as principals in the crime of Murder defined and
penalized under Article 248 of The Revised Penal Code with the mitigating
circumstance of voluntary surrender on the part of Dante Samson and no
mitigating circumstance modifying the commission of the offense on the part of
Rolando Manlulu.”^[1] As a
result, accused Dante Samson was sentenced to a prison term of ten (10) years
and one (1) day of prision mayor, as minimum, to seventeen (17) years,
four (4) months and one (1) day of reclusion
temporal, as maximum,
while accused Rolando Manlulu, to twelve (12) years, five (5) months and eleven
(11) days of reclusion temporal, as minimum, to eighteen (18) years,
eight (8) months and one (1) day of reclusion
perpetua as
maximum. They were also sentenced
jointly to indemnify the offended party P30,000.00 as compensatory damages and
P10,410.00 for hospitalization and funeral expenses, and to pay the costs.

Upon review, the appellate court raised their penalties to reclusion perpetua and certified the case to this Court pursuant
to Sec. 13, Rule 124, of the 1985 Rules on Criminal Procedure.^[2]

Testifying for the prosecution, Wally Manlapaz, a.k.a. Crisanto
Meneses, narrated that at around ten o’clock in the evening of 29 May 1986, he
and accused Dante Samson and Rolando Manlulu were having a drinking spree in an
alley along Quirino Avenue, Paco, Manila. They were later joined by Agent Gerardo Alfaro who had a .45 cal. pistol
tucked to his waist. When Alfaro
arrived he blurted out, “Dito may kumakatalo sa aking tao.”^[3]
At twelve o’clock midnight, the group transferred in front of the house of
Manlapaz and continued to drink. There
Samson suddenly stabbed Alfaro in the chest with a 6-inch double-bladed knife
while boasting, “Dapat sa iyo manahimik na.”^[4]
Alfaro at this time was “somewhat bent because he was already drunk.”^[5]
Manlulu then followed suit and stabbed Alfaro in the abdomen several times with
an ice pick they used to chip ice. Samson grabbed the .45 cal. service pistol of Alfaro and shot him in the
neck. When Alfaro slumped on the
pavement, both accused fled, with Samson holding Alfaro’s handgun. After a few seconds, both accused returned
and got Alfaro’s wristwatch and wallet.^[6]

Noel Pagco, another
witness for the prosecution, recounted that at the time of the shooting he was
outside the alley where the accused and the deceased were drinking. After hearing a gunshot coming from the
direction of the alley, he saw Dante Samson and Rolando Manlulu coming out the
alley, the former tucking a gun in his waist and sporting a watch on his right wrist, and the latter holding an ice pick.^[7]

As already adverted to,
both accused invoke self-defense. According
to Samson, while they were drinking, and after taking ekis pinoy,^[8] Alfaro
said he had a “prospect” and invited them to go with him. Thinking that “prospect” meant
they were going to rob somebody, Samson excused himself by saying that he had
just been released from prison, and had yet to fetch his wife. Alfaro, apparently resenting Samson’s
unwillingness to join them, drew his gun and pointed it to Samson who parried
it saying: “Pare, wala tayong biruan ng
ganyan. Baka pumutok iyan.” But Alfaro repeatedly pointed the gun to
him. Every time he did, Samson would
push the gun aside. Fearful that it
might go off, he held the gun and tried to ward it off, resulting in a struggle
for its possession. He got hold of the
ice pick on top of the drum and stabbed Alfaro instinctively. Manlapaz tried to separate them; as a consequence, Samson dropped the ice pick. As Samson and Alfaro continued to wrestle for the possession of
the gun, they fell on the ground and the gun accidentally went off hitting
Alfaro in the neck. Rattled, Samson
immediately fled. He then fetched his
wife from Malate, proceeded to Pasay City, and sent word to his father who
later accompanied him to surrender to Capt. Pring of the Homicide Division of
the Western Police District. When he
fled, he left behind Alfaro’s gun.^[9]

Rolando Manlulu
corroborated the testimony of his co-accused. He added that he picked up the ice pick when it fell, and fearing that
he might be the next victim should Alfaro succeed in shooting Samson, he
(Manlulu) stabbed Alfaro several times with the ice pick, then dropped it, and
ran away. He looked back and saw Samson
and Alfaro fall on the pavement. Almost
simultaneously, the gun went off.^[10]

Patrolman Reynaldo Perez
recounted that at around seven o’clock in the evening of 30 May 1986 he,
together with some other officers, arrested Manlulu on the information given by
Manlapaz. He said that he seized from
Manlulu the .45 cal. pistol and Casio wristwatch said to belong to Alfaro,^[11] and that Manlulu verbally confessed
to the commission of the crime. Patrolman Perez however admitted on cross-examination that when he
arrested Manlulu and seized from him the handgun as well as the wristwatch, he
(Perez) was not with any warrant nor did he inform the accused of the latter’s
right to counsel. Perez added that at
that time Manlulu was under the influence of liquor.^[12]

Dr. Marcial Ceñido,
Medico-Legal Officer of the Western Police District, confirmed that Alfaro sustained
nine (9) wounds, four (4) of them fatal, i.e., a gunshot wound in the neck, a
penetrating stab wound probably caused by a bladed weapon, and two (2) stab
wounds probably caused by an ice pick.^[13]

In this appeal, accused
Manlulu and Samson would want us to believe, first, in their version of the
incident, and next, that they acted in self-defense.

The account of the
appellants does not inspire belief. A
review of the testimony of Manlapaz, who admittedly had drunk a little too
much, reveals that his story tallies not only with some accounts of accused
Samson and Manlulu but also with the findings of Dr. Ceñido. Hence, except for the actual attack on the
victim, the testimonies of Samson and Manlulu square with that of Manlapaz,
including the conversation that took place. Thus we give credence to the testimony of Manlapaz that Samson used a
bladed weapon and not an ice pick in stabbing Alfaro, contrary to what Samson
would want us to believe. This version
of Manlapaz is consistent with the necropsy report of Dr. Ceñido which states
that the deceased had a penetrating stab wound which could have been caused by
a bladed weapon. That Manlulu according
to Manlapaz used an ice pick in repeatedly stabbing Alfaro was not only
admitted by Manlulu on the witness stand but is confirmed likewise by the
medical findings of Dr. Ceñido.

If Manlapaz was indeed too drunk to recall the events that
transpired before the actual killing, then in all probability he could not have
remembered the weapons used by the accused. Certainly, eyewitness Manlapaz could not have been so drunk as to muddle
those incidents which impute guilt to the accused and recall only those which
are consistent with their innocence.

Similarly, we cannot disregard those portions of the testimonies
of the two accused which tend to confirm the narration of Manlapaz. Expectedly, the accused will refute the
statements tending to establish their culpability. Hence, they have to differ in some respects from the narration of Manlapaz. Since it appears from the testimony of Manlapaz that he had not
yet reached that degree of intoxication where he would have otherwise lost
control of his mental faculties, we find his version to be credible as it
conforms with the autopsy report and admissions of both accused.^[14] Thus, we sustain the factual findings of the
trial court and reject the version of the defense. But, even if we consider the theory of the accused thus far if
only to satisfy them, still they cannot elude the consequences of their
felonious acts. By invoking
self-defense, the accused admit killing Alfaro. The burden of proof is thus shifted to them. Their duty now is to establish by clear and
convincing evidence the lawful justification for the killing.^[15] In this regard, they have miserably failed.

The three (3) requisites
for self-defense are: (1) unlawful
aggression on the part of the victim; (2) reasonable necessity of the means
employed to prevent or repel it; and, (3) lack of sufficient provocation on the
part of the person defending himself.^[16] For self-defense to prosper, it must be
positively shown that there was a previous unlawful and unprovoked
attack that placed the life of the accused in danger which forced him to
inflict more or less severe wounds upon his assailant, employing therefore
reasonable means to resist said attack.^[17]

Here, at the outset, the
two accused have already failed to show that there was unlawful aggression on
the part of Alfaro. A gun aimed at the
accused, without more, is insufficient
to prove unlawful aggression. For unlawful aggression to be appreciated in
self-defense, there must be an actual, sudden and unexpected attack or imminent
danger thereof, and not merely a threatening or intimidating attitude.^[18]

Even the means employed
to repel or prevent the supposed attack was not reasonable. For, even if we disregard the gunshot wound
which Samson claims to have resulted from an accidental firing, the victim also
suffered seven other stab wounds, three of which were fatal, one of which was
admittedly inflicted by Samson, while the other two, by accused Manlulu. Definitely, it was not necessary to stab,
more so repeatedly, the victim. Considering their relative positions as they
drank – each within the other’s reach – all that was necessary was for the two
accused to band together and overpower the lone victim with their bare hands,
assuming the deceased was indeed pointing his gun at one of them. A stab wound may not necessarily be fatal
and thus enable the victim to fire his gun. But a firm grasp by the two accused of the victim’s arm holding the gun,
or of the gun itself, could prevent the victim from shooting them. At any rate, the number of wounds suffered
by Alfaro indicates a determined effort of both accused to kill the victim,
which negates self­-defense.^[19]

Furthermore, their flight
from the scene of the crime is a strong indication of their guilt.^[20] Indeed, a righteous individual will not
cower in fear and unabashedly admit the killing at the earliest opportunity if
he were morally justified in so doing. A belated plea suggests that it is false and only an afterthought made
as a last ditch effort to avoid the consequences of the crime.^[21] If the accused honestly believed that their
acts constituted self-defense against the unlawful aggression of the
victim, they should have reported the incident to the police, instead of
escaping and avoiding the authorities until they were either arrested or
prevailed upon to surrender.^[22]

The reliance of the accused on the Constitution
however is warranted. Certainly, the
police authorities should have first obtained a warrant for the arrest of
accused Rolando Manlulu, and for the search and seizure of his personal
effects. The killing took place at one
o’clock in the morning. The arrest and
the consequent search and seizure came at around seven o’clock that evening,
some nineteen hours later. This
instance cannot come within the purview of a valid warrantless arrest. Paragraph (b), Sec. 5, Rule 113 of the 1985
Rules on Criminal Procedure provides that the arresting officer must have
“personal knowledge” of an offense which “has in fact just been
committed.” In the instant case, neither did Pat. Perez have
“personal knowledge,” nor was the offense “in fact just
been committed.” While Pat. Perez may have personally gathered the
information which led to the arrest of Manlulu, that is not enough. The law requires “personal
knowledge.” Obviously, “personal gathering of information” is
different from “personal knowledge.” The rule requires that the
arrest immediately follows the
commission of the offense, not some nineteen hours later. This is not any different from People v. Cendana^[23] where
the accused was arrested one day after the killing of the victim, and only on
the basis of information obtained by the police officers. There we said that the “circumstances
clearly belie a lawful warrantless arrest.”

However, the flaw, fatal
as it may be, becomes moot in view of the eyewitness account of Manlapaz which
we find to be credible. Hence, in spite
of the nullification of the arrest of accused Manlulu, and the exclusion of
real evidence, i.e., the .45 cal. service pistol of Agent Alfaro and his
Casio wristwatch, as well as his extra-judicial confession which
was taken in violation of the provisions of the Constitution, still the
prosecution was able to prove the guilt of the accused beyond reasonable
doubt. After all, the illegality of the
warrantless arrest cannot deprive the state of its right to prosecute the
guilty when all other facts on record point to their culpability.^[24]

While we confirm the
factual findings of the trial court, which were affirmed by the appellate
court, we nevertheless differ from the conclusions drawn that treachery and
conspiracy attended the killing of Alfaro. Indeed, there is serious doubt as to whether treachery could be
appreciated against the two accused. There is nothing on
record to show that both accused deliberately employed means tending to insure
the killing of Alfaro without risk to themselves arising from the defense which
the latter might make. It must be noted
that Alfaro set the mood of the evening with a threatening tone that someone in
the group was provoking him. Clearly,
the attack on Alfaro who was then
armed with a .45 cal. revolver by Samson who on the other hand was merely armed
with a knife could not have been so sudden as to catch the former
off-guard. In fact, Manlapaz testified
that after Samson’s initial attack on Alfaro the latter was even able to push
Samson back.^[25]
Even Manlulu, who impulsively stabbed the victim, only picked up the ice pick
they were using to chip ice. Taking into
account the attendant circumstances, our minds cannot rest easy in appreciating
the aggravating circumstance of treachery. Hence, the two accused may only be convicted of simple homicide.

There was no conspiracy likewise in the killing of Alfaro. Settled is the rule that neither joint nor
simultaneous action per se is a sufficient indicium of
conspiracy.^[26]
The evidence shows that it was the victim who chanced upon Manlapaz and the two
accused drinking, and decided to
join then. Accused Manlulu was not even
armed when he went to the drinking spree. We have often said that conspiracy must be established beyond reasonable
doubt. Here, the prosecution failed to
show that Manlulu and Samson conspired to kill Alfaro. There being no conspiracy, each is liable
for his own acts.

The penalty for homicide is reclusion temporal^[27]
the range of which is twelve (12) years and one (1) day to twenty (20)
years. Applying the Indeterminate
Sentence Law to accused Rolando Manlulu, there being no mitigating nor aggravating circumstance, the maximum of his
penalty shall be taken from the medium period of reclusion temporal,
which is fourteen (14) years, eight (8) months and one (1) day to seventeen
(17) years and four (4) months, while the minimum shall be taken from the penalty
next lower in degree, which is prision mayor, the range of which is six
(6) years and one (1) day to twelve (12) years, in any of its periods.

As regards accused Dante Samson, although he is entitled to the
mitigating circumstance of voluntary surrender, the same is offset by reiteracion
or habituality he having previously been convicted once of robbery and thrice of theft^[28] within ten (10) years prior to this
incident, each time serving sentence therefor, which further bars him from
availing of the provisions of the Indeterminate Sentence Law.^[29] Consequently, he should be sentenced to reclusion
temporal medium the range of which
is fourteen (14) years, eight (8) months and one (1) day to seventeen (17)
years and four (4) months. Furthermore,
being a habitual delinquent as
defined in the last paragraph of Art. 62 of The Revised Penal Code,^[30] he should serve an additional penalty within
the range of prision mayor maximum
to reclusion temporal minimum.^[31] And, as correctly determined by the
appellate court, the civil liability of both accused is increased from
P30,000.00 to P50,000.00. In addition,
both accused are liable to indemnify the heirs of their victim in the amount of
P10,410.00 for hospitalization
and funeral expenses.

WHEREFORE, the judgment appealed from is modified as
follows:

(a) ROLANDO MANLULU is found guilty of HOMICIDE
and is sentenced to an indeterminate prison term of eight (8) years, two (2)
months and one (1) day of prision mayor medium, as minimum, to fourteen
(14) years, eight (8) months and one (1) day of reclusion temporal
medium, as maximum;

(b) DANTE SAMSON is found guilty of HOMICIDE and
is sentenced to a straight prison term of fourteen (14) years, ten (10) months
and twenty (20) days of reclusion temporal medium and, for being a
habitual delinquent, is ordered to serve an additional penalty of ten (10)
years and one (1) day of prision mayor maximum; and

(c) ROLANDO MANLULU and DANTE SAMSON are directed jointly and
severally to pay the heirs of Gerardo Alfaro the amount of P50,000.00 as civil
indemnity and P10,410.00 as death and funeral expenses, with costs.

SO ORDERED.

Cruz, (Chairman), Davide, Jr., Quiason, and Kapunan, JJ., concur.

^[1]
Decision penned by Judge Elisa R. Israel, Regional Trial Court of Manila, Branch
4, p. 13.

^[2]
Decision penned by Justice Consuelo Ynares Santiago, concurred in by Justices
Ricardo L. Pronove, Jr. (Chairman), and Nicolas P. Lapeña, Jr., Fifteenth
Division, Court of Appeals.

^[3]
TSN, 7 September 1987, p. 3, 22 December
1986, pp. 17-20.

^[4]
Id., pp. 6-9.

^[5]
lbid.

^[6]
lbid.

^[7]
Id., 7 April 1987, pp. 3-8.

^[8]
A prohibited drug distributed by accused Alfaro.

^[9]
TSN, 7 September 1987, pp. 9-16.

^[10]
Id., 27 October 1987, pp. 13-18.

^[11]
Id., 24 February 1987, pp. 4-5.

^[12]
Id., pp. 13-15.

^[13]
Id., 6 April 1987, pp. 5-8.

^[14]
People v. Molina, G.R. No. 59436, 28 August 1992, 213 SCRA 52.

^[15]
People v. Boniao, G.R. No. 100800, 27 January 1993, 217 SCRA 653; People
v. Mindac, G.R. No. 83030, 14 December 1992, 216 SCRA 558.

^[16]
Par. 1, Art. 11, The Revised Penal Code.

^[17]
People v. Amania, G.R. No. 97612, 23 March 1993, 220 SCRA 347.

^[18]
People v. Salazar, G.R. No. 84391, 7 April 1993, 221 SCRA 170,
citing People v. Rey, G.R. No. 80089, 13 April 1989, 172 SCRA 149 and People
v. Bayocot, G.R. No. 55285, 28 June 1989, 174 SCRA 285.

^[19]
See People v. Sagadsad, G.R. No.
88042, 13 November 1992, 215 SCRA 641.

^[20]
People v. Rivera, G.R. No.
101798, 10 May 1993, 221 SCRA 647; People v. Molina, G.R. No. 59436, 28 August 1992, 213 SCRA 52.

^[21]
People v. Salazar, see Note 18.

^[22]
See Note 20, Ibid.

^[23]
G.R. No. 84715, 17 October 1990, 190
SCRA 538.

^[24]
People v. Briones, G.R. No.
90319, 15 October 1991, 202 SCRA 708.

^[25]
TSN, 22 December 1986, p. 7.

^[26]
People v. Regular, No. L-38674, 30 September 1981, 108
SCRA 23, citing U.S. v. Magcomot, 13 Phil. 386 and People
v. Caballero, 53
Phil. 585.

^[27]
Art. 249, The Revised Penal Code.

^[28]
Accused Dante Samson first served sentence for robbery on 29 January 1975 and
was paroled on 11 July 1975, then imprisoned for theft on 31 October 1979 and
discharged on 6 April 1980, then again committed to prison for simple theft on
8 October 1980 and discharged on 13 May 1982, and finally recommitted for theft
on 18 April 1983 and discharged on 23 September 1983; Exhs. “S” and
“S-1” (Records, pp. 11-12) and TSN,
5 October 1987, pp. 5-6.

^[29]
Sec. 2, Act No. 4103, as amended.

^[30]
The last paragraph of Art. 62 of The Revised Penal Code reads: “For purposes of this article, a person
shall be deemed to be habitual delinquent, if within a period of ten years from
the date of his release or last conviction of the crimes of serious or less
serious physical injuries, robo, hurto, estafa, or falsification, he is found guilty of any of said crimes a third time or oftener.”

^[31]
Par. 5(c), Art. 62, The Revised Penal Code.