JESUS TORRES, PETITIONER, VS. PEOPLE OF THE PHILIPPINES, RESPONDENT.

Torres versus People

The Case

This is the case of Torres versus People, decided by the Supreme Court in August 2011. Jesus Torres, the principal of a public high school in Catanduanes, was convicted by the trial court of malversation of public funds after he encashed three checks representing his teachers' salaries and allowances and never delivered the money. He tried to appeal, but his lawyer filed the notice of appeal with the Court of Appeals instead of the Sandiganbayan. The case matters for two reasons: it fixes the rule on appeals erroneously taken to the wrong court, and it confirms that a school principal entrusted with public funds is an accountable public officer who may be convicted of malversation.

Procedural History

Jesus Torres was charged with malversation of public funds before the Regional Trial Court of Virac, Catanduanes. He pleaded not guilty, and trial on the merits followed. The trial court convicted him and sentenced him to an indeterminate prison term, perpetual special disqualification, and a fine equal to the amount malversed.

Torres filed a notice of appeal indicating that he was appealing to the Court of Appeals. Months later, he filed a manifestation and motion admitting that he had filed the appeal before the wrong tribunal, and he asked that the case be referred to the Sandiganbayan. The Office of the Solicitor General asked that the appeal be dismissed outright. The Court of Appeals dismissed the appeal for lack of jurisdiction, and it denied his motion for reconsideration. Torres then came to the Supreme Court by petition for review on certiorari, raising a single error: whether the Court of Appeals erred in dismissing his appeal outright instead of certifying the case to the proper court.

Facts

Jesus Torres was the principal of Viga Rural Development High School. On April 26, 1994, he directed Edmundo Lazado, the school's collection and disbursing officer, to prepare the checks for the teachers' and employees' salaries, salary differentials, additional compensation allowance, and personal emergency relief allowance for January to March 1994. Lazado prepared three checks totaling 196,654 pesos and 54 centavos, all dated April 26, 1994. Torres and the head teacher signed them. Following the school's custom, Lazado endorsed the checks and handed them to Torres, who would encash them at the Philippine National Bank in Virac and deliver the cash to Lazado for distribution.

The next day, April 27, 1994, Torres encashed the three checks, but he never returned to the school to deliver the money. For the defense, Torres admitted encashing the checks that morning, but claimed that instead of returning to school he went to the airport and flew to Manila to seek medical attention for chest pain. He said that two days later, around four thirty in the morning of April 29, 1994, three armed men held him up and took his bag containing his personal effects and the proceeds of the checks. He reported the incident to the police but never recovered the money.

The trial court found that the prosecution had established all the elements of the offense and convicted him of malversation of public funds under Article 217 of the Revised Penal Code.

Issues

• Whether or not the Court of Appeals erred in dismissing the petitioner's appeal outright instead of certifying the case to the proper court, the Sandiganbayan.
• Whether or not the petitioner, a school principal of a public high school, is an accountable public officer within the contemplation of Article 217 of the Revised Penal Code.
• Whether or not the petitioner's conviction for malversation through negligence violated his constitutional right to be informed of the accusation against him, when the Information charged intentional malversation.

Applicable Provisions

Paragraph 3, Section 4 (c) of Republic Act Number 8249, which defines the jurisdiction of the Sandiganbayan, provides:

The Sandiganbayan shall exercise exclusive appellate jurisdiction over final judgments, resolutions or orders of the regional trial courts whether in the exercise of their own original jurisdiction or of their appellate jurisdiction as herein provided.

This provision fixes the Sandiganbayan, not the Court of Appeals, as the proper court to review the trial court's judgment of conviction.

Section 2, Rule 50 of the Rules of Court provides:

An appeal erroneously taken to the Court of Appeals shall not be transferred to the appropriate court, but shall be dismissed outright.

This is the rule that compelled the dismissal of the appeal that was filed with the wrong court.

Article 217 of the Revised Penal Code, as quoted in the decision, provides in its opening sentence:

Any public officer who, by reason of the duties of his office, is accountable for public funds or property, shall appropriate the same or shall take or misappropriate or shall consent, through abandonment or negligence, shall permit any other person to take such public funds, or property, wholly or partially, or shall otherwise be guilty of the misappropriation or malversation of such funds or property, shall suffer the penalties provided by law.

This is the offense charged, and its text shows that malversation may be committed either intentionally or through negligence.

Ruling

On the first issue, the Court held that the petition is without merit. Under Republic Act Number 8249, the Sandiganbayan has exclusive appellate jurisdiction over final judgments of the regional trial courts, so upon his conviction the petitioner's remedy should have been an appeal to the Sandiganbayan. The Court of Appeals had no jurisdiction to review the judgment. The Court stressed that the designation of the wrong court does not necessarily affect the validity of the notice of appeal, but the designation of the proper court must be made within the fifteen-day period to appeal. Here, the trial court promulgated its decision on August 31, 2005, the notice of appeal was filed on September 8, 2005, and the petitioner tried to correct the error only on February 10, 2006, well beyond the fifteen-day period. Thus, the Court of Appeals correctly dismissed the appeal outright.

On the second issue, the Court held that the petitioner is an accountable public officer. An accountable public officer is one who has custody or control of public funds or property by reason of the duties of his office. It is the nature of the officer's duties, and the fact that he received public money for which he is bound to account and failed to account for it, that determines whether malversation is committed. A school principal of a public high school may therefore be held guilty of malversation if he is entrusted with public funds and misappropriates them.

On the third issue, the Court held that the argument lacks merit. Malversation may be committed either through a positive act of misappropriation or passively through negligence. To sustain the charge, there must either be criminal intent or criminal negligence, and even when the Information charges willful malversation, conviction for malversation through negligence may still be adjudged if the evidence ultimately proves that mode of commission. The Court quoted its own ruling:

Malversation is committed either intentionally or by negligence. The dolo or the culpa present in the offense is only a modality in the perpetration of the felony. Even if the mode charged differs from mode proved, the same offense of malversation is involved and conviction thereof is proper.

Dolo means intent and culpa means negligence; either way, the offense is the same malversation.

Doctrine

First, the Sandiganbayan has exclusive appellate jurisdiction over final judgments of the regional trial courts in malversation cases, and an appeal erroneously taken to the Court of Appeals shall not be transferred to the appropriate court but shall be dismissed outright under Section 2, Rule 50 of the Rules of Court. The designation of the proper court must be made within the fifteen-day period to appeal; once that period lapses, dismissal is mandatory.

Second, an accountable public officer under Article 217 of the Revised Penal Code is one who has custody or control of public funds or property by reason of the duties of his office. A school principal of a public high school entrusted with public funds is such an officer and may be convicted of malversation.

Third, malversation may be committed intentionally or through negligence, and intent and negligence are merely modalities in the perpetration of the same felony. A conviction for malversation through negligence is proper even if the Information charges willful malversation, because the same offense is involved and the accused's right to be informed is not violated.

Disposition

The petition was denied, and the resolutions of the Court of Appeals dismissing the appeal outright were affirmed; Jesus Torres lost and his conviction for malversation of public funds stood.

Remember This

Memorize this line: an appeal erroneously taken to the Court of Appeals shall not be transferred to the appropriate court but shall be dismissed outright, and the proper court must be designated within the fifteen-day period to appeal. Examiners like to use this case on the exclusive appellate jurisdiction of the Sandiganbayan, on the accountability of a school principal for public funds, and on the rule that intent and negligence are only modalities of the same crime of malversation.