LAW ON EVIDENCE | PEOPLE VS. VALERIO, JR., L-4116, FEBRUARY 25, 1982

PEOPLE VS. VALERIO, JR., 

L-4116, FEBRUARY 25, 1982


FACTS

The case revolves around a plot of murder of an eight-year old boy for insurance. On July 31, 1975, the trial Court, disbelieving the respective alibi of VALERIO and ELEPAÑO convicted them. The evidence for the prosecution as against VALERIO consisted mainly in the testimony of self- confessed and convicted accused Amador Castro, who described the details of the morbid scheme, as well as the testimonies of Dr. Pedro Romero, Herminigildo Solar, Dr. Prospero Cabanayan and Generoso Dangca. On April 25, 1973, Amador Castro executed another Statement before NBI agent Libit, Dulog and Pagdonsolan. Therein Amador Castro related essentially the same details he testified to in open Court, categorically implicating accused VALERIO. In said Statement, Castro narrated that sometime in November 1972, VALERIO proposed the insurance on the boy Castro had picked up at the Pantranco bus, who would be killed later so that they could collect the insurance proceeds. In the same, Statement, Exhibit "l", Castro also implicated accused Domingo ELEPAÑO. That Castro had told ELEPAÑO on the way from Pangasinan to Cavite of the plan to kill the boy that he promised ELEPAÑO P 2,000.00 upon collection of the insurance proceed; and that ELEPAÑO had clubbed the boy on the head with a piece of iron at sea.  Castro, however, repudiated under oath and in open Court his said Statement in so far as ELEPAÑO is concerned and stressed that ELEPAÑO had nothing to do with the killing. Whether ELEPAÑO’s guilt has been established in this case.


HELD No. Well-settled is the rule that extrajudicial statements of an accused implicating a co-accused cannot be utilized against the latter unless repeated in open Court. A written extrajudicial statement of a person who was not presented as a witness to be cross-examined on his supposed statement is not admissible in evidence under the principle of "res inter alios alteri nocere non debet”.

In so far as ELEPAÑO is concerned, it find the evidence of the prosecution insufficient to establish his guilt beyond reasonable doubt. The only evidence linking him to the crime is found in Castro's Statement given to the NBI on April 25, 1973, Exhibit " 1 ". Castro, however, repudiated under oath and in open Court his said Statement in so far as ELEPAÑO is concerned and stressed that ELEPAÑO had nothing to do with the killing. That repudiation results in the wiping out of crucial threads of evidence linking ELEPAÑO to the conspiracy. No other prosecution witness testified on ELEPANO's participation in the conspiratorial criminal scheme. VALERIO declared that he did not know ELEPAÑO What the evidence establishes merely is that ELEPAÑO was hired to drive the jeep used in transporting the Castros, VALERIO, and the boy to Lido Beach Resort at Cavite City, and that he was paid by Castro for the trip from Pangasinan to Cavite and back to Pangasinan. The circumstances that ELEPAÑO had sent a wreath for the dead boy and that he was present at the funeral parlor do not necessarily lead to the inference that he, too, was part of the conspiracy.







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