G.R. No. 12778. August 03, 1917
THE UNITED STATES, PLAINTIFF AND APPELLEE, VS. ONG SIU HONG, DEFENDANT AND APPELLANT.
MALCOLM, J.:
relative to the credibility of the witnesses for the prosecution, members of the
secret service. One point only requires consideration.
Counsel for appellant raises the constitutional question that the accused was
compelled to be a witness against himself. The contention is that this was the
result of forcing the accused to discharge the morphine from his mouth. No case
exactly in point can be found. But, by analogy, the decision of the Supreme
Court of the Philippine Islands in U. S. vs. Tan Teng ([1912] 23 Phil.,
145), following leading authorities, and the persuasive decisions of other
courts of last resort, are conclusive. To force a prohibited drug from the
person of an accused is along the same line as requiring him to exhibit himself
before the court; or putting in evidence papers and other articles taken from
the room of an accused in his absence; or, as in the Tan Teng case, taking a
substance from the body of the accused to be used in proving his guilt. It would
be a forced construction of the paragraph of the Philippine Bill of Rights in
question to hold that any article, substance, or thing taken from a person
accused of crime could not be given in evidence. The main purpose of this
constitutional provision is to prohibit testimonial compulsion by oral
examination in order to extort unwilling confessions from prisoners implicating
them in the commission of a crime. (Harris vs. Coats [1885], 75 Ga.,
415.)
Following the practice of this court in cases of this character, the judgment
of the lower court is modified by imposing the minimum penalty provided by law,
i. e., three months imprisonment and a fine of P300 or, in case of insolvency,
to suffer subsidiary imprisonment, with costs. (U. S. vs. Lim Sing,
[1912] 23 Phil., 424; U. S. vs. Sy Liongco, [1915] 33 Phil., 53.) So
ordered.
Arellano, C. J., Johnson, Carson, Araullo, and Street, JJ.,
concur.