THE PEOPLE OF THE PHILIPPINES, PLAINTIFF-APPELLEE, VS. TERESITA S. SINGSON, DEFENDANT-APPELLANT.

This case is an appeal from a decision convicting the accused of estafa,
and sentencing her to the penalty of reclusion perpetua with its
accessory penalties and ordering her to indemnify the Sucrex Marketing
Corpration in the amount of P163,000.00, with interest.

The facts of the case, as found by the trial court, can be
summarized as follows. Sucrex Marketing
Corporation (Sucrex for short) is a private corporation engaged in the trading
and marketing of commodities, among which is sugar. On August 4, 1976, the accused Teresita Singson (accused for
short) was introduced to Vicente Cenzon, trading manager of Sucrex, by Rene
Antonio, who had previous business dealings with the corporation. On that day, the accused bought 1,000 bags
of sugar from Sucrex at P74.50 per bag, and for which documents known as
“delivery orders and advice” for the total amount of P74,500.00 were
issued to her. She paid for the sugar
by means of two postdated checks dated August 7 and August 11, 1976 (Exhs. 1-A
and 1-B), respectively. These checks
were honored by the drawee bank.

On August 9, 1976, the accused went again to Sucrex and bought
4,000 bags of sugar at the price of P75.00 per bag. Again, 20 sets of delivery orders and advice were made out and
delivered to her. According to the
testimony of Cenzon, in the sugar trading business, sales of sugar are made
through “delivery orders and advice” documents prepared in
triplicate, the original of which is given to the customer-buyer. The latter then presents the documents to
the sugar central or warehouse, for delivery of the sugar as specified in the
documents.

In payment for the 4,000 bags of sugar, the accused issued six
checks, five of which were postdated. Of these six checks, only two were honored by the bank. The four other checks (Exhs. E, F, G and H)
in the total sum of P200,000.00, were dishonored when they were deposited on
their due dates. These checks were
deposited and dishonored three times, and on the fourth time, they were
returned on the basis of the “BAP rule”, under which a check cannot
be dishonored four times and thus cannot be redeposited on the fourth
time. Early in the month of September,
1976, when the accused was advised of the dishonor of the checks, she offered
to issue seven replacement checks (Exhs. J, J-1 to J-6) in the total amount of
P200,000.00, which offer was accepted by Sucrex. However, when Sucrex deposited three of the checks, they were
dishonored with the note “Try next clearing”. The check marked Exhibit J was deposited
three times, while those marked Exhibit J-1 and J?2 were deposited twice,
and they were dishonored each time. Because of this, Sucrex did not deposit the remaining checks.

On September 14, 1976, Sucrex, through Vicente Cenzon, wrote to
the accused demanding full payment of the P200,000.00. Upon receipt of the letter, the accused went
to Cenzon’s office and offered to make partial payment, explaining that she was
unable to fund her checks on time due to the sudden and unforeseen fluctuation
in the price of sugar, which resulted in her inability not only to collect from
her own buyers, but to sell all the sugar as she had expected. Sucrex refused to accept the offer of
partial payment at that time, but eventually, on October 12, 1976, Sucrex
accepted the offer of the accused to pay P30,000.00 in cash and the return of
92 bags. In the receipt (Exh. L) issued
by Sucrex, it is indicated that:

“Acceptance of this payment shall not in any way novate your
obligation to Sucrex Marketing Corporation under our sale to you of 4,000 bags
(of) refined sugar per our Delivery Order Nos. 2801-2822.”

The accused was unable to pay or deposit
the amount covered by any of the dishonored checks.

On March 11, 1980, an information was filed with the then Court
of First Instance of Rizal in Pasig, entitled “People of the Philippines
vs. Teresita S. Singson”, charging the accused with estafa based on
the six checks originally given by her in payment of the 4,000 bags of
sugar. The information charged that the
accused “by means of deceit and false pretenses, with intent to gain and
to defraud the Sucrex Marketing Corporation, did then and there willfully,
unlawfully and feloniously induce said corporation to sell her 4,000 bags of
sugar at P75.00 per sack . . . and in payment (sic) thereof said accused
knowing that she did not have sufficient funds in the bank, did then (and)
there willfully, unlawfully and feloniously make out and deliver to the said
Sucrex Marketing Corp. six (6) personal checks, to wit: . . . . representing to the said corporation
that the checks were good checks and would be honored upon presentment for
payment . . . “. The information
further charged that only two of the six checks were honored and that the
dishonor of the four checks in the total amount of P200,000.00, caused damage
and prejudice to Sucrex.

After trial, the lower court found the accused guilty as charged
and imposed upon her the penalty of reclusion perpetua. The lower court based its decision on the
provisions of Article 315 of the Revised Penal Code as amended by P.D. 818, the
pertinent portion of which read as follows:

“Art. 315. Swindling
(estafa). Any person who shall defraud
another by any of the means mentioned hereinbelow shall be punished by:

1st. The penalty of reclusion
temporal if the amount of the fraud is over 12,000 pesos but does not
exceed 22,000 pesos, and if such amount exceeds the latter sum, the penalty
provided in this paragraph shall be imposed in its maximum period, adding one
year for each additional 10,000 pesos but the total penalty which may be
imposed shall in no case exceed thirty years. In such cases, and in connection with the accessory penalties which may
be imposed under the Revised Penal Code, the penalty shall be termed reclusion
perpetua;

x x x                          x x x

2.  By means of any of the following false
pretenses or fraudulent acts executed prior to or simultaneously with the
commission of the fraud:

x x x                          x x x

(d)  By post-dating a check, or issuing a check in
payment of an obligation when the offender had no funds in the bank, or his
funds deposited therein were not sufficient to cover the amount of the
check. The failure of the drawer of the
check to deposit the amount necessary to cover his check within three (3) days
from receipt of notice from the bank and/or the payee or holder that said check
has been dishonored for lack or insufficiency of funds shall be prima facie
evidence of deceit constituting false pretense or fraudulent act.”

Since the amount involved is P200,000.00,
applying the above provision, the resulting penalty is thirty years, the maximum penalty that may be
imposed.^[1]

The counsel for the accused-appellant raised five assignments of
error, all of which can be reduced to one: That the Court a quo erred in not acquitting the accused-appellant of the crime charged on
the ground that her guilt was not proven beyond reasonable doubt.

For the crime of estafa to exist, the element of fraud or bad
faith is indispensable. And its presence must be proven beyond a
reasonable doubt before the accused can be found guilty of such crime. Although in the case of a bouncing check
under B.P. Blg. 22, failure of the drawee to deposit the amount necessary to
cover his checks within three days from notice of its dishonor shall be prima
facie evidence of fraud or deceit, under Article 315 of the Revised
Penal Code, mere failure to make such deposit cannot be the basis for
conviction if the surrounding circumstances tend to show the absence of bad
faith or deceit. In the present case, We find the evidence not
sufficient to establish the existence of fraud or deceit on the part of the
accused.

The accused testified, and this was not controverted, that at the time she issued the six checks on August 9, 1976 she had more than P100,000.00 in the bank. In fact, the
first two checks were honored by the bank. She expected to sell the sugar in time to deposit enough money to cover
the four checks which were later dishonored. Unforseen circumstances prevented her from doing so. Perhaps, on account of these circumstances, Sucrex, through Cenzon, finally agreed
to take replacement checks, and when these were dishonored, it finally agreed to accept a partial payment of P30,000.00 in cash and the return of
92 bags of sugar.

These circumstances — the prompt action of the accused in
offering to replace the dishonored checks and in later making partial payment
and the taking of postdated checks and subsequently of the replacement checks,
and the acceptance of partial payment — show, first, that in all probability
Sucrex knew that the funds to cover the six
postdated checks subject of
this action were to come from the sale of the sugar which the accused had bought from it. This kind of a situation is not unusual in
the trading of commodities like sugar and rice. If Sucrex had such knowledge, then it follows that there was no
deceit. And where there is no proven
deceit or fraud, there is no crime of estafa. On the other hand, one who is guilty
of bad faith would probably not have acted the way the accused did. If she had fraudulent intentions at the time
of the sale and the issuance of the subject checks, her normal reaction would
have been to hide or at least avoid or delay confrontation with Sucrex. But she did neither. On the contrary,
as soon as she was
notified of the dishonor, she immediately went to Cenzon’s office to offer
replacement checks and later, partial
payment, both of which were accepted by Sucrex, through Cenzon. In fact, she even returned some 92 bags of sugar which she was unable to sell. Moreover, since the accused was new in the sugar
trading business, she was perhaps not completely aware of the attendant risks,
like instability in the price of sugar.

Although the established facts may prove the civil liability of
the accused to pay the balance of
the purchase price of the sugar (a liability which incidentally she has never
denied), considering the above, Our mind cannot “rest easy on the
certainty of guilt”. We are not convinced that the evidence in
this case has proven beyond reasonable doubt that the accused was guilty of
fraud or deceit when she issued the checks in question. It therefore follows that she cannot be
convicted of estafa as charged. All the other issues raised by the parties become irrelevant in
the face of this reasonable doubt as to the guilt of the accused, and need not
therefore be considered by this Court.

WHEREFORE, the decision of the lower court is hereby
REVERSED and SET ASIDE and the accused is hereby ACQUITTED of the charge of estafa
on the ground that her guilt has not been proven beyond a reasonable doubt,
without prejudice to any civil liability which may be established in a civil case
against her.

SO ORDERED.

Feliciano, Regalado, and
Nocon, JJ., concur.

Narvasa, C.J., (Chairman), on
official leave.

^[1]
At the time acts complained of took place, the above was the only provision
penalizing the issuance of bouncing checks. The Bouncing Checks Law (B.P. Blg. 22) was passed later in April, 1979.