LAW ON EVIDENCE | PEOPLE VS. SERRANO ET AL, 105 PHIL 531

PEOPLE VS. SERRANO ET AL, 

105 PHIL 531


FACTS Domingo Cadiang, Santiago Yumul, and Filemon Cenzon were found guilty of murder in Criminal Case No. 1262 by the Court of First Instance of Pampanga. They were part of a group led by Cenon Serrano alias Piping who planned to kill Pablo Navarro for his supposed involvement in urging people to testify on the Maliwalu massacre to Senator Pablo Angeles David. The group waited for Navarro at several locations and eventually lured him to a drinking spree where they made him drunk before taking him to a remote location. There, Navarro was tied up and shot to death by the group, with Cenon Serrano alias Piping being the one who gave the order to tie Navarro's hands with a rope. The other defendants were found guilty along with their co-defendants who did not appeal and were sentenced to suffer reclusion perpetua and pay indemnity and their proportionate share in the costs. In addition to the verdict for the death of Simplicio Manguerra, the Court found Cenon Serrano alias Piping, Benjamin Tolentino, Melchor Esguerra, Domingo Cadiang, Santiago Yumul and Filemon Cenzon guilty beyond reasonable doubt. Only Domingo Cadiang, Santiago Yumul and Filemon Cenzon have appealed. The appellants contend further that in order that the testimony of a conspirator may be admissible in evidence against his co-conspirator, it must appear and be shown by evidence other than the admission itself that the conspiracy actually existed and that the person who is to be bound by the admission was a privy to the conspiracy. And as there is nothing but the lone testimony of prosecution witness Anastacio Reyes, a co-conspirator, the trial court erred in finding that conspiracy has been established and in convicting the appellants based upon the lone testimony of their co-conspirator. Whether the the trial court err in convicting the appellants (co-conspirators) based on the testimony of a conspirator during the joint trial.


HELD No. The contention does not merit serious consideration, because the rule that "The act or declaration of a conspirator relating to the conspiracy and during its existence, may be given in evidence other than such act or declaration," 1 applies only to extra-judicial acts or declaration, but not to testimony given on the stand at the trial, 2 where the defendant has the opportunity to cross-examine the declarant. And while the testimony of accomplices or confederates in crime is always subject to grave suspicion, "coming as it does from a polluted source," and should be received with great caution and doubtingly examined, it is nevertheless admissible and competent.  fear that self-incriminating statements may be obtained by inhumane treatment and abuses, and the respect for the inviolability of the human personality and of the right of each individual "to a private enclave where he may lead a private life." 








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