PEOPLE OF THE PHILIPPINES, PLAINTIFF-APPELLEE, VS. RAYMUNDO CORFIN, ACCUSED-APPELLANT.

People versus Corfin

The Case

People versus Corfin is a criminal case in which the People of the Philippines prosecuted Raymundo Corfin for the abduction, sexual assault, and killing of a four-year-old child, Ad Jane Zabala. The trial court convicted him of the complex crime of rape with homicide and imposed the supreme penalty of death. The case matters to every reviewee because the Supreme Court, on automatic review, affirmed the killing but struck down the rape conviction, holding that circumstantial evidence, however persuasive, cannot supply the element of carnal knowledge when the medical evidence is inconclusive. It is a master class on the sufficiency of circumstantial evidence and on the constitutional command that guilt be proved beyond reasonable doubt for each and every element of the offense.

Procedural History

An Information was filed against the accused before the Regional Trial Court, Branch 35, of the Eleventh Judicial Region in General Santos City. At arraignment, with the assistance of counsel, he pleaded not guilty, and trial ensued. The prosecution presented four witnesses and the autopsy findings; the defense presented the accused alone, who raised denial and alibi. The trial court rendered judgment finding him guilty beyond reasonable doubt of rape with homicide under Article 335 of the Revised Penal Code as amended by Section 11 of Republic Act Number 7659, sentenced him to death, and awarded civil indemnity, moral damages, exemplary damages, and actual damages. Because the death penalty was imposed, the case was automatically elevated to the Supreme Court for review. On appeal, the accused assigned a single error: that the trial court gravely erred in convicting him on the basis merely of circumstantial evidence that did not prove with moral certainty that he was the perpetrator.

Facts

On the morning of May 18, 1995, Rosemarie Zabala left her home in Barangay Fatima, General Santos City, to bring her youngest child to the rural health center. She returned at eleven in the morning and found that her four-year-old daughter, Ad Jane, was missing. Her husband Alejandro, a fisherman, rushed home, reported the disappearance to the police, and sought help from local radio stations.

That same morning, two neighbors, Imelda Arnado and Alma Lawas, saw the accused, a jeepney conductor they knew, seated in front of an abandoned store talking with the child. At about eleven o'clock they saw the accused walking toward RFM with Ad Jane close behind him. At about the same hour, Mariano Mahinay met the accused on the footpath carrying the child on his shoulder; the child was still alive. At one o'clock in the afternoon, Rosanna Rentillo saw the accused walking downhill, wearing a yellow sleeveless shirt and short pants, looking very dirty and perspiring profusely.

The following afternoon, May 19, 1995, Alejandro was told that a child had been found in a dry creek. He found Ad Jane's body lying face up, her hands raised above her head and her legs spread apart. Her slippers and panty were recovered nearby. The autopsy showed a lacerated wound at the right inguinal area with evisceration of the intestine, and a vagina very much inflamed with lacerations at the six o'clock and five o'clock positions; the cause of death was hemorrhage secondary to rape. The accused admitted he was at the abandoned store that morning and wore a yellow sleeveless shirt and short pants, but denied talking to any child and interposed denial and alibi.

Issues

• Whether or not the circumstantial evidence presented by the prosecution is sufficient to establish the guilt of the accused beyond reasonable doubt.
• Whether or not the evidence conclusively proves that the accused raped the victim, so as to sustain a conviction for the complex crime of rape with homicide.
• Whether or not the accused may nonetheless be held liable for homicide, and if so, what penalty and damages should be imposed.

Applicable Provisions

Article 335 of the Revised Penal Code, as amended by Section 11 of Republic Act Number 7659, defines and penalizes rape, and is the provision under which the trial court convicted the accused of rape with homicide:

Article 335. When and how rape is committed. Rape is committed by having carnal knowledge of a woman under any of the following circumstances: 1. By using force or intimidation; 2. When the woman is deprived of reason or otherwise unconscious; and 3. When the woman is under twelve years of age or is demented.

The Court used this provision to test whether the element of carnal knowledge had been proved, and concluded that it had not.

Article 249 of the Revised Penal Code defines and penalizes homicide, and is the provision under which the Court ultimately convicted the accused:

Article 249. Homicide. Any person who, not falling within the provisions of Article 246, shall kill another without the attendance of any of the circumstances enumerated in the next preceding article, shall be deemed guilty of homicide and be punished by reclusion temporal.

Because the rape was not proved but the killing was, this provision supplied the proper offense and the penalty of reclusion temporal.

Ruling

On the first issue, the Court held that circumstantial evidence is sufficient to convict when three requisites concur: there is more than one circumstance; the facts from which the inferences are derived are proven; and the combination of all the circumstances produces a conviction beyond reasonable doubt. The circumstances must form an unbroken chain leading to one fair and reasonable conclusion pointing to the accused, to the exclusion of all others. The Court found that chain here: the accused was the last person seen with the victim; he was seen carrying her toward the dry creek; he was seen leaving the place alone and in disarray; and the body was found there the next day. His own admissions placed him at the abandoned store, in the same clothing the witnesses described. Denial and alibi are inherently weak defenses, and his alibi failed because his house was only eight hundred meters from the dry creek, not so far as to make his presence at the scene impossible. The minor inconsistencies in the witnesses' accounts concerned trivial details and did not destroy their credibility, especially absent any showing of improper motive.

On the second issue, however, the Court held that the evidence did not conclusively prove rape. The trial court had relied on the position of the body, the missing panty, and the vaginal lacerations. But the physician testified that the laceration could have been caused by a hard object, a sharp instrument, a stone, or an erect penis, and when asked directly she answered that she was not sure. Absent conclusive and categorical evidence that the laceration was caused in the course of coitus or by a male organ, the accused could not be held liable for rape.

On the third issue, the Court held that the same circumstantial evidence sufficiently established the killing, so the accused was liable for homicide under Article 249. There being no mitigating or aggravating circumstance, the penalty was reclusion temporal in its medium period, or fourteen years, eight months and one day to seventeen years and four months. Under the Indeterminate Sentence Law, that became the maximum term, while the minimum was taken from prision mayor, the penalty next lower. The Court deleted the award of exemplary damages because no generic aggravating circumstance attended the crime, but affirmed the civil indemnity, actual damages, and moral damages.

Doctrine

First, circumstantial evidence is sufficient for conviction when there is more than one circumstance, the facts from which the inferences are drawn are proven, and the combination of all the circumstances produces a conviction beyond reasonable doubt; the circumstances must form an unbroken chain consistent with guilt and inconsistent with every hypothesis except that of guilt.

Second, each element of the offense must be proved beyond reasonable doubt. Where the prosecution fails to prove the element of carnal knowledge, as when the medical witness cannot categorically state that the vaginal laceration was caused by a male organ, a conviction for rape cannot stand, even if the killing is established.

Third, denial and alibi are inherently weak defenses; for alibi to prosper, the accused must prove not only that he was elsewhere when the crime was committed, but also that he was so far away that he could not have been physically present at the place of the crime or its immediate vicinity at the time of its commission.

Fourth, when the evidence proves a killing but not the rape, the accused may be convicted of homicide under Article 249 of the Revised Penal Code, with the penalty of reclusion temporal in its medium period absent any modifying circumstance, and with the indeterminate sentence fixed under the Indeterminate Sentence Law.

Disposition

The Supreme Court modified the decision of the trial court: it found Raymundo Corfin guilty beyond reasonable doubt of homicide, not rape with homicide, sentenced him to an indeterminate penalty of twelve years of prision mayor as minimum to seventeen years and four months of the medium period of reclusion temporal as maximum, and ordered him to pay the heirs of Ad Jane Zabala civil indemnity, actual damages, and moral damages, while deleting the exemplary damages.

Remember This

The line worth memorizing is that circumstantial evidence may prove the killing but cannot supply an element the evidence leaves uncertain, so the accused was convicted of homicide and acquitted of rape. Examiners use this case to test the requisites of circumstantial evidence, the weakness of denial and alibi, and the rule that every element of the crime must be proved beyond reasonable doubt.