People vs Amigo

Doctrine : The duty of courts is to apply the law, disregarding their feeling of sympathy or pity for an
accused. DURA LEX SED LEX. The remedy is elsewhere - clemency from the executive or an amendment of the law
by the legislative, but surely, at this point, this Court can but apply the law.
The problem in any event is addressed not to this Court but to the Congress. Penalties are prescribed by statute
and are essentially and exclusively legislative. As judges, they can only interpret and apply them and have no authority
to modify them or revise their range as determined exclusively by the legislature. They said that they should not
encroach on this prerogative of the lawmaking body.

Facts :

On December 29, 1989, at around 1:00 P.M., after having spent half-day at their store, located at No. 166-A, Ramon
Magsaysay Avenue, Davao City, Benito Ng Suy was driving their gray Ford Fiera back home, situated at the back of
Car Asia, Bajada, Davao City. With him during that time were his daughters, Jocelyn Ng Suy and a younger one
together with his two year old son, who were all seated at the front seat beside him while a five year old boy was also
seated at the back of the said vehicle. (TSN, April 29, 1991, pp. 3-5; TSN, March 31, 1992)

On their way home and while traversing the National Highway of Bajada, Davao City, an orange Toyota Tamaraw
driven by one Virgilio Abogada, suddenly made a left turn in front of the Regional Hospital, Bajada, Davao City, without
noticing the Ford Fiera coming from the opposite direction. This Tamaraw was heading for Sterlyn Kitchenette, which
was situated at the corner of the said hospital
With Virgilio was Patricio Amigo alias Bebot, a vulcanizer at Linglings vulcanizing shop owned and operated by a
certain Galadua. He was also seated at the right front seat beside Virgilio.
Due to the unexpected veer made by Virgilio, an accidental head on collision occurred between the Fiera and the
Tamaraw, causing a slight damage to the right bumper of the latter. (TSN, March 31, 1992, p. 4)
Right after the collision, Benito immediately alighted from the drivers seat and confronted Virgilio Abogada who
also went down from his vehicle. (TSN, April 29, 1991, p. 5)
Benito, who was a big man with a loud voice told Virgilio, You were not looking, to which Virgilio retorted, I did not
see you. (TSN, April 29, 1991, p.16)
While the two drivers where having this verbal confrontation, Patricio who was merely a passenger of Virgilio also
alighted from the front seat of the Tamaraw and instantaneously approached Benito and advised the latter to leave
since it was merely a small and minor accident. (TSN, April 29, 1991, pp. 16-18)
A bit irritated with the actuation exhibit by Patricio, Benito rebuked the former and told him not to interfere, since
he had nothing to do with the accident. (Ibid., p. 7)
Irked by the comment made by Benito, Patricio sarcastically asked; You are Chinese, is it not? With a ready
answer Benito said; Yes, I am a Chinese and why? Patricio in turn replied; So, you are a Chinese, wait for a while, then
left. (Ibid., pp. 7 and 19)
Immediately thereafter, Benito ordered Jocelyn to call a policeman, but after a lapse of about one minute, Patricio
returned and arrogantly approached Benito, asking the latter once again, You are a Chinese, is it not? To this Benito
calmly responded in the affirmative.
(Ibid., pp. 7, 19-20)
Upon hearing the response, Patricio mumbled Ah, so you are a Chinese, and suddenly took a five inch knife from
his waist and simultaneously stabbed Benito hitting him twice on the chest
After being hit, Benito wounded and sensing that his life was in peril, tried to evade his assailant by pushing
Patricio away and run around the Tamaraw but Patricio wielding the same knife and not content with the injuries he
had already inflicted, still chased Benito and upon overtaking the latter embraced him and thrusted his knife on the
victim several times, the last of which hit Benito on the left side of his body. (Ibid., pp. 8, 10, 22)
It was at this juncture that Jocelyn who was still inside the Ford Fiera, pleading for mercy to spare her father tried
to get out of the vehicle but it was very unfortunate that she could not open its door. (Ibid., p. 10)
 Knowing that Patricio was really determined to kill her father by refusing to heed her pleas, Joselyn shouted for
help, since there were already several people around witnessing that fatal incident, but to her consternation nobody
lifted a single finger to help them. (Ibid., pp. 6, 10, 18, 21-22) Only after her father lay seated on the floor of their Ford
Fiera after being hit on the left side of his body that she was able to open the door of the said vehicle. (Ibid., p. 12)
After this precise moment, her younger sister, upon seeing their father bathing with his own blood, embraced him,
causing Patricio to cease from his ferocious assault and noticing the presence of several people, he fled. (Ibid., p. 22)
Thereafter, an enraged Jocelyn chased him, but since the assailant ran faster than her, she was not able to
overtake him, thus, she instead decided to go back to where her father was and carried him inside the Tamaraw who
bumped them and consequently brought him to San Pedro Hospitalwhere he was attended to at the Emergency
Room. (Ibid., p. 13)
While at the Emergency Room, Benito who was on a very critical condition, due to multiple (13) stabbed wounds,
was operated by Dr. Rolando Chiu. After the operation, he was subsequently brought to the ICU and stayed there for
three (3) weeks. (July 12, 1991, pp. 3 and 4)
In a last ditch effort to save his life, having only 10 to 20 percent survival, Benito was airlifted to Manila and was
directly confined at the Chinese General Hospital. After three (3) weeks of confinement, Benito expired. CAUSE OF
DEATH - SEPSIS (an overwhelming infection). This means that the infection has already circulated in the blood all over
the body. (Ibi

The accused was charged with frustrated murder but was changed to murder due to the supervening
circumstance.
The court held him guilty for murder.

Accused-appellant contends that under the 1987 Constitution and prior to the promulgation of Republic Act
No. 7659, the death penalty had been abolished and hence, the penalty that should have been imposed for the crime
of murder committed by accused-appellant without the attendance of any modifying circumstances, should
be reclusion temporal in its medium period or 17 years, 4 months and 1 day, to 20 years of reclusion temporal.

. . . Since the death penalty (or capital punishment) is not imposable when the stabbing and killing happened, the
computation of the penalty should be regarded from reclusion perpetua down and not from death penalty. Indeed, the
appropriate penalty is deducible from reclusion perpetua down to reclusion temporal in its medium period. Hence, there
being no modifying circumstances present (p. 5 Decision, ibid.), the correct penalty should be in the medium period
(Art. 64, par. 1, Revised Penal Code) which is 17 years, 4 months and 1 day to 20 years of reclusion temporal.
Finally, accused-appellant claims that the penalty of reclusion perpetua is too cruel and harsh a penalty and
pleads for sympathy. Courts are not the forum to plead for sympathy.

ISSUE : Should Soriano be punished with reclusion perpetua?

Held : Yes.

(take note of the prior ruling by the SC in People vs. Gavarra, Justice Pedro L. Yap declared for the Court that in
view of the abolition of the death penalty under Section 19, Article III of the 1987 Constitution, the penalty that may be
imposed for murder is reclusion temporal in its maximum period to reclusion perpetua, thereby eliminating death as
the original maximum period. Later, without categorically saying so, the Court, through Justice Ameurfina A.
Melencio-Herrera in People vs. Masangkay and through Justice Andres R. Narvasa in People vs. Atencio, divided the
modified penalty into three new periods, the limits of which were specified by Justice Edgardo L. Paras in
People vs. Intino, as follows: the lower half of reclusion temporal maximum as the minimum; the upper half
of reclusion temporal maximum as the medium; and reclusion perpetua as the maximum)

The Court reversed its current doctrine providing for three new periods for the penalty for murder as reduced by the
Constitution. It returned to the original interpretation and hold that Article III, Section 19(1) does not change the
periods of the penalty prescribed by Article 248 of the Revised Penal Code except only insofar as it prohibits the
imposition of the death penalty and reduces it to reclusion perpetua. The range of the medium and minimum
penalties remains unchanged.
 The Court realizes that this interpretation may lead to certain inequities that would not have arisen under Article
248 of the Revised Penal Code before its modification. Thus, a person originally subject to the death penalty and
another who committed the murder without the attendance of any modifying circumstance will now be both punishable
with the same medium period although the former is concededly more guilty than the latter.
(may Bible story about ung parable ni Jesus na naginvite ng workers ung day’s pay baka iask)
The problem in any event is addressed not to this Court but to the Congress. Penalties are prescribed by statute
and are essentially and exclusively legislative. As judges, they can only interpret and apply them and have no authority
to modify them or revise their range as determined exclusively by the legislature. They said that they should not
encroach on this prerogative of the lawmaking body.
Coming back to the case at bar, we find that there being no generic aggravating or mitigating circumstance
attending the commission of the offenses, the applicable sentence is the medium period of the penalty prescribed by
Article 248 of the Revised Penal Code which, conformably to the new doctrine here adopted and announced, is
still reclusion perpetua. This is the penalty we imposed on all the accused-appellants for each of the three murders they
have committed in conspiracy with the others. The award of civil indemnity for the heirs of each of the victims is affirmed
but the amount thereof is hereby increased to P30,000.00 in line with the present policy.
(at pp. 120-125.)
The duty of courts is to apply the law, disregarding their feeling of sympathy or pity for an accused. DURA LEX
SED LEX. The remedy is elsewhere - clemency from the executive or an amendment of the law by the legislative, but
surely, at this point, this Court can but apply the law.
HERRERA VS SANDIGAN BAYAN

DOCTRIINE : Conspiracy can be inferred from the acts of the accused which clearly manifest a concurrence of wills,
a common intent or design to commit a crime. The familiar rule in conspiracy is that when two or more persons agree
or conspire to commit a crime, each is responsible, when the conspiracy is proven, for all the acts of the others, done
in furtherance of the conspiracy.29

FACTS:

Petitioners Pat. Edgardo Herrera y Baltoribio and Pat. Redentor Mariano y Antonio, together with the other accused,
Pat. Roberto Barrera and Pat. Rodolfo Alcalde, all members of the Parañaque Police Station, were charged with two
(2) counts of murder, FOR THER KILLING OF Shi Shu Yang and George Go y Tan, before public respondent
Sandiganbayan in Criminal Case Nos. 16674 and 16675.

Reynaldo Ong was the manager of Chow Chow Restaurant which was owned by Spouses George Go, one of the
victims, and Edna Ong Go, located at 5 Country Homes Commercial Center, Dr. A. Santos Avenue, Parañaque,
Metro Manila. Ong was the younger brother of Edna Go. At about 4:00 am of December 28, 1989, Ong heard two
explosions. He proceeded to the third floor of the restaurant to check on what had happened and as he looked down,
he saw accused Pat. Roberto Barrera and his friend lighting firecrackers at the back of restaurant. Ong descended
the stairs toward the ground floor of the restaurant where he saw the victims George Go and Shi Shu Yang. George
Go asked for some firecrackers from him and proceeded to the kitchen to light the firecrackers. From a distance
outside the restaurant, accused Barrera shouted, "Pare, meron pa ba?" (asking if there are still firecrackers) to which
George Go responded, "Marami pa." ("There are still plenty.") After George Go responded in the affirmative, accused
Barrera went to the restaurant armed with a .38 caliber pistol tucked in his waist. George Go then went upstairs, took
his .45 caliber pistol from an attache case, tucked it in his waist, and went back to the kitchen. Moments later,
accused Barrera approached George Go, introduced himself as a Parañaque policeman, and disarmed him (George
Go) of his licensed .45 caliber pistol. Barrera then shouted at his (Barrera’s) companion, a policeman, who was
upstairs, "Ilabas mo iyong mahaba" (ordering the companion to bring out the long firearm) while commanding George
Go to come out as he had went to the parking lot to hide there. Ong pleaded with Barrera and told him that George
Go would surface only if Barrera would not shoot him. As soon as George Go emerged from the parking lot, Barrera
said, "Tarantado kang Chekwa ka, ako yung nagbigay sa iyo ng sobre" (uttering invective upon the victim with the
use of the pejorative term for Chinese as he referred to his Christmas solicitation from the victim who gave him twenty
pesos (₱20) and two t-shirts). George Go was quiet. Barrera also demanded that George Go present the license of
his firearm which the latter readily showed. Barrera then told George Go that he would bring the firearm to the police
station for verification. He then called the police station informing them that he had just disarmed George Go.8

At about 6:00 a.m. of that same day, George Go and his Taiwanese friend, the victim Shi Shu Yang, were brought to
the Parañaque Police Station. Reynaldo Ong proceeded, but went back to the house to inform Edna Go, wife of
George Go, to go to the police station. When she arrived at the police station, Edna Go saw her husband, who was
making a telephone call, and Shi Shu Yang. She heard Barrera demanding George Go to produce his license to carry
a firearm. Barrera also told George Go to undergo medical examination, but the latter refused. Thus, Barrera,
together with the petitioners and accused Alcalde, shoved George Go to the wall and made him and Shi Shu Yang
ride a police car waiting nearby. They took the victims to the Parañaque Community Hospital for medical
examination. Thereafter, the two were brought to Timothy Street along Multinational Village where they were shot to
death.9

( notes on the autopsy: rAt around 7:00 p.m., Dr. Garcia also conducted an autopsy on the body of Shi Shu Yang in
the said funeral parlor. The Autopsy Report No. 89-4196 (Exhibit "D") indicated that Shi Shu Yang sustained three
gunshot wounds. He made a diagram (Exhibit "E") identifying the locations of the gunshot wounds and, likewise,
issued a Certificate of Post-Mortem Examination (Exhibit "F"). Illustrating a distance of about 24 inches, the entry
point of gunshot wound no. 1 was at the back of the head of the victim with no exit point as the deformed bullet was
lodged therein. `The entry point of gunshot wound no. 2 was on the left side of the neck of the victim (0.6 by 0.8
centimeters) and exit point on the right side of the neck (1.2 by 1 centimeter in cross diameter). He concluded that the
assailant must have been at the left of the victim when the shot was fired. As for gunshot wound no. 3, the distance
between the muzzle of the gun and the right arm could have

On cross-examination, he declared that the reason why the two Chinese nationals were brought to

abrasion inflicted on his neck was due to an alleged scuffle with somebody but said injury could also be self-
inflicted.22

On December 13, 1994, public respondent Sandiganbayan26 convicted each of the petitioners of two (2) counts of
murder. Holding all the accused as co-principals and as conspirators for the crimes.

At the Supreme Court petitioners assert that there was total absence of evidence to support the theory that
conspiracy attended the commission of the crime.

ISSUE : ARE THE ACCUSED GUILTY OF THE CRIMES AND ARE THEY LIABLE AS CO CONSPIRATORS ?

HELD : YES.

Conspiracy can be inferred from the acts of the accused which clearly manifest a concurrence of wills, a common
intent or design to commit a crime. The familiar rule in conspiracy is that when two or more persons agree or conspire
to commit a crime, each is responsible, when the conspiracy is proven, for all the acts of the others, done in
furtherance of the conspiracy.29 In this case, petitioner Herrera drove the vehicle along Timothy Street to a place
which was less conspicuous to passersby. There, Pat. Alcalde, Pat. Barrera, and petitioner Mariano brought out the
two victims from the back portion of the van in order to perpetuate the killing. Petitioner Mariano alighted from the
right front seat of the van and stood beside Pat. Alcalde and Pat. Barrera who began shooting the victims. According
to Winterhalter, petitioner Mariano even appeared to be writing something on a sheet of paper immediately before the
shooting, although it cannot be determined with certainty as to whether he was making an inquiry or merely noting the
names of the victims. While it was Pat. Barrera who actually shot the two victims, the evidence showed a common
design on the part of both petitioners as they did not do anything to prevent him from killing the victims, thus,
indicative of the fact that they are in unison with the criminal design of the Pat. Barrera. Petitioner Herrera alighted
form the van without doing anything to prevent the killing, and worse, after the killing took place along the street,
petitioner Herrera even helped carry the two victims into the van while petitioner Mariano, the driver, remained in the
vehicle during the incident. Consequently, applying the rule that the act of one is the act of all, petitioners are thus as
guilty as Pat. Barrera and Pat. Alcalde. In fact, conspiracy need not be established by direct evidence but may be
inferred from the surrounding circumstances.

.37

WHEREFORE, the petition is DENIED for lack of showing that public respondent Sandiganbayan committed any
reversible error. The Decision of public respondent Sandiganbayan, dated December 13, 1994, finding petitioners
Pat. Eduardo Herrera y Baltoribio and Pat. Redentor Mariano y Antonio guilty beyond reasonable doubt as co-
principals for two (2) counts of murder and sentencing each of them to suffer the penalty of reclusion perpetua with
the accessory penalties of civil interdiction during the time of their sentence and perpetual absolute disqualification for
public office is AFFIRMED WITH MODIFICATION. Additionally, petitioners are ORDERED to pay the heirs of Shi
Shu Yang and George Go y Tan each in the amount of ₱50,000 as civil indemnity, ₱50,000 as moral damages,
P11,500 for actual damages, and ₱25,000 as exemplary damages. Costs against the petitioners.