PEOPLE OF THE PHILIPPINES, PLAINTIFF-APPELLEE, VS. PABLO MOLERO, DEFENDANT-APPELLANT.

People of the Philippines versus Molero

The Case

This is the People of the Philippines against Pablo Molero, a criminal prosecution for rape in which the accused stands charged with having had carnal knowledge of his own seventeen-year-old daughter, Pacita Molero, on the banks of the Siaton River in Negros Oriental. The case matters to the reviewee for two reasons. First, it is a clean illustration of the requisites of double jeopardy and of why a provisional dismissal that directs the filing of a new complaint is not an acquittal. Second, it teaches the rule on amending the date of the commission of a crime after arraignment, and how force and intimidation may be established even where the victim did not physically resist.

Procedural History

The original complaint, dated March 22, 1977, charged the accused with rape committed on or about February 13, 1976. He was arraigned and pleaded not guilty. During trial, the complainant testified that the rape occurred on February 5, 1976. On that basis the assistant provincial fiscal moved to amend the complaint, and the trial court initially admitted the amended complaint. On the accused's motion for reconsideration, however, the trial court set aside its earlier order, denied admission of the amended complaint, and dismissed the case, but expressly ordered that the accused remain in custody and directed the fiscal to file a new complaint for the proper offense of rape committed on or before February 5, 1976. A corrected complaint dated March 30, 1978 was then filed. The accused moved to quash on the ground of double jeopardy, and the motion was denied. He was arraigned anew, pleaded not guilty, and after trial the Court of First Instance of Negros Oriental convicted him of rape under Article 335 of the Revised Penal Code, sentencing him to reclusion perpetua and to indemnify the complainant in the amount of 10,000 pesos, plus costs. He appealed to the Supreme Court.

Facts

On the morning of February 5, 1976, the accused told his daughter Pacita, then barely seventeen years old, to accompany him to the Siaton River at Tamlang, Santa Catalina, Negros Oriental, about a kilometer from their house, ostensibly to catch shrimps and fish. When they reached a secluded stretch of the riverbank, with Pacita walking ahead, her father suddenly hugged her from behind. She staggered and fell face up, and he fell with her, holding her left hand behind her back and kneeling on her right arm.

When she struggled, he unsheathed a sharp bolo and placed it along her side. He then pulled up her dress and removed her short pants and panty. She cried and asked why he was doing this to her, and he answered only that she should shut up. He then had sexual intercourse with her. When she tried to kick him, he again held the bolo to her side, and, afraid and cowed by his moral ascendancy as her father, she submitted. Before she walked home, he warned her not to tell her mother, or he would kill them all.

Pacita told her mother only three days later, on February 8, 1976, saying she could no longer endure what her father had been doing to her. On February 11, 1976, mother and daughter reported the matter to the station commander of Pamplona and later to the Philippine Constabulary headquarters, where Pacita gave a statement. The accused was investigated and gave a sworn statement in which he admitted having destroyed his daughter's virtue. The examining physician found old lacerations of the hymen at several positions, indicating prior sexual intercourse. The accused denied the charge and set up alibi, claiming he had been confined in the provincial jail since December 7, 1975, but the supervising prison guard testified from jail records that he was committed only on December 2, 1976.

Issues

• Whether or not the accused was placed in double jeopardy by the dismissal of the first case and his prosecution under the corrected complaint.
• Whether or not the accused committed the crime of rape, that is, whether force and intimidation attended the sexual act.

Applicable Provisions

Section 9, Rule 117 of the Revised Rules of Court, now substantially reproduced as Section 7, Rule 117 of the 1985 Rules on Criminal Procedure, provides:

Former conviction or acquittal; double jeopardy. -- When defendant shall have been convicted or acquitted, or the case against him dismissed or otherwise terminated without the express consent of the defendant by a court of competent jurisdiction, upon a valid complaint or information or other formal charge sufficient in form and substance to sustain a conviction and after the defendant had pleaded to the charge, the conviction or acquittal of the defendant or the dismissal of the case shall be a bar to another prosecution for the offense charged, or for any attempt to commit the same or frustration thereof, or for any offense which necessarily includes or is necessarily included in the offense charged in the former complaint or information.

This provision supplies the requisites of double jeopardy and frames the first issue, because the accused claims the dismissal of the first case operated as an acquittal.

Section 10, Rule 110 of the Revised Rules of Court provides:

Time of the commission of the offense. - It is not necessary to state in the complaint or information the precise time at which the offense was committed except when time is a material ingredient of the offense, but the act may be alleged to have been committed at any time as near to the actual date at which the offense was committed as the information or complaint will permit.

This provision establishes that the precise date is generally not an essential element of the offense, which is decisive on whether the change of date was a matter of form.

Section 13, Rule 110 of the Revised Rules of Court provides:

Amendment. - The information or complaint may be amended, in substance or form, without leave of court, at any time before the defendant pleads; and thereafter and during the trial as to all matters of form, by leave and at the discretion of the court, when the same can be done without prejudice to the rights of the defendant.

This provision governs whether the amendment of the date after arraignment should have been allowed, and it turns on whether the change was of form and without prejudice to the accused.

Ruling

On the first issue, the Court held that there was no double jeopardy. The dismissal of the first case was not a definite or unconditional dismissal that terminated the case. The order of dismissal expressly directed the fiscal to file a new complaint for the proper offense, and the case was dismissed for no other reason than to correct the date of the crime from on or about February 13 to on or about February 5. The Court stressed that for a dismissal to bar a second prosecution under the jeopardy clause, it must have the effect of an acquittal, and this dismissal did not. The first proceedings had not been terminated, so there was no second proceeding to speak of.

The Court added that the trial court need not have used such a cumbersome procedure. It should simply have denied the motion for reconsideration and allowed the amendment, because the precise time of the commission of rape is not an essential element of the offense. The change of eight days was a matter of form that did not prejudice the rights of the accused. The Court distinguished the Opemia case, where the amendment sought to change the date by five years, a gap so great as to defy approximation.

On the second issue, the Court held that the evidence clearly established force and intimidation. The complainant's testimony showed that her father suddenly hugged her from behind, held her arms, knelt on her right arm, and unsheathed a bolo which he placed at her side, warning her that he would kill her if she continued to struggle. Her failure to resist further was born of fear and of his moral ascendancy as her father. The Court rejected the suggestion that the crime was only qualified seduction, and affirmed the conviction.

Doctrine

First, double jeopardy requires a prior conviction, acquittal, or a dismissal or termination without the express consent of the accused, by a competent court, upon a valid complaint sufficient in form and substance, and after the accused has pleaded. A dismissal that is provisional, or that expressly directs the filing of a new complaint for the proper offense, does not terminate the case and cannot be the basis of double jeopardy. Second, the precise date of the commission of a crime is not an essential element unless time is a material ingredient of the offense, so an amendment correcting the date after arraignment is a matter of form that the court may allow when it does not prejudice the rights of the accused. Third, force and intimidation in rape may be established by the accused's moral ascendancy over his victim, and the victim's failure to resist further does not negate the crime where it springs from fear of the bolo and of the accused's threats.

Disposition

The Supreme Court affirmed the judgment of conviction, holding the accused guilty beyond reasonable doubt of rape and sustaining the penalty of reclusion perpetua and the award of indemnity to the complainant.

Remember This

Memorize this line: a dismissal that expressly directs the filing of a new complaint for the proper offense is not an acquittal, so it cannot ground double jeopardy. Examiners use this case to test the requisites of double jeopardy, the amendment of the date of the crime after arraignment, and force and intimidation through moral ascendancy.