[ G.R. No. L-591. June 30, 1948 ] 81 Phil. 193
[ G.R. No. L-591. June 30, 1948 ]
THE PEOPLE OF THE PHILIPPINES, PLAINTIFF AND APPELLEE, VS.DOMINADOR VILLA ET AL., DEFENDANTS, DOMINADOR VILLA, EULOGIO MOLINA, AND TRANQUILINO (ALIAS AQUILINO) BERNARDINO, APPELLANTS. D E C I S I O N
FERIA, J.:
The defendants in this case, Dominador Villa, Eulogio Molina, Tranquilino Bernardino and Eligio Gomez, were charged with rape, and the Court of First Instance of Ilocos Norte found them guilty thereof, and sentenced each one of them to an indeterminate penalty of from 12 years of prisión mayor to 20 years of reclusion temporal, to pay jointly and severally the offended party an indemnityof P500, with the accessory penalties prescribed by law, and the costs. Subsequently, the court amended its decision with regard to Dominador Villa, who was 17 years old at the time of the commission of the offense, by appreciating his age as a mitigating circumstance and imposing upon him an indeterminate penalty from 10 years and 1 day of prisión mayor to 17 years, 4 months and 1 day of reclusión temporal.
From the trial court’s decision the four accused appealed; but prior to the transmittal of the record to this Court, the defendant Eligio Gomez withdrew his appeal. Two of the appellants, namely, Dominador Villa and Eligio Molina, have filed their briefs. But the attorney de oficio appointed for Tranquilino Bernardino filed with this Court, instead of a brief, a statement to the effect that, after examining the record of the case, particularly the written statement or confession of the accused Tranquilino Bernardino, he finds no ground to justify the reversal of the judgment of the lower court.
The evidence presented in this case show, beyond a reasonable doubt, that the four defendants, each one armed with a bolo and Bernardino with a revolver besides a bolo, at about 9 o’clock in the evening of February 13, 1945, went up the house of the offended party, and once inside the house ordered the inmates thereof to light a lamp and after the lamp was lighted the defendants Villa and Molina grabbed the offended party Consolacion Felipe, a girl of about 29 years of age by the hands and forced her to go down stairs, followed by Bernardino and Gomez, and dragged her to a nearby granary belonging to one Moises Domingo. When they arrived under the said granary, the defendants held Consolacion’s hands, Dominador Villa slapped her and threw her to the gound. Thereafter, inspite of her resistance, each and every one of the accused, while the others were holding Consolacion by the hands, succeeded one after the other in having sexual intercourse with her. After having satiated their lusts the defendants left the offended party, who returned to her homo crying, and upon being asked the reason why, she exclaimed: “It would be better if I were dead because the four men have raped me.” The next day after the commission of the offense Consolacion Felipe reported the outrage committed against her by the defendants to the Barrio Lieutenant and to the Philippine Army Sergeants Miguel Andres and Monico Caldito, and the latter ordered the arrest of the accused. Upon being investigated, they confessed having attacked and raped Consolacion Felipe, and Bernardino also admitted having a revolver which was recovered from his house by a soldier sent with him to get it. They signed separate written confessions sworn to on April 6, 1945, before the Secretary of the Jury organized by Lieut. Col. R. H. Arnold of the 15th Infantry Regiment USAFIP, Northern Luzon, appointed by the Military Mayor of Laoag, which were presented and admitted as Exhibits A, B, C and D.
As to appellant Villa, his attorney does not claim that the finding of the lower court that the defendant has committed the offense charged is erroneous; he contends that the trial court erred in not suspending the judgment against him, in accordance with article. 80 of the Revised Penal Code, as amended by Commonwealth Act No. 99, and commiting the appellant to a reformatory. As according to Exhibit B, this appellant was only 16 years, 9 months and 16 days old when he committed the crime, the contention of the apellant Villa is correct and well taken.
The recommendation or statement filed with this Court by the attorney do oficio for Tranquilino Bernardino, to the effect that, after examining the record of the case particularly the written statement of Tranquilino Bernardino, he finds no ground to ask for the reversal of the decision of the lover court is also well grounded.
With respect to the appellant Molina, his only defense is that he had a sexual intercourse with the offended party because he was forced to do so by two unknown soldiers who threatened to shoot him if he refused to do so, and that the latter consented to it “she herself having lifted up her dress and she handled my virile member and put it into her genital organ”. This defense, aside from being contradicted by conclusive evidence, is in itself very incredible. There is no reason whatever why the imaginary two soldiers should compel the appellant Molina to have sexual intercourse with Consolacion Felipe. And taking into consideration the proverbial modesty of Filipino country women, it is inconceivable that the offended party, a single and honest girl of 29 years of age, should have openly and willingly performed the said acts attributed to her in the presence of several persons.
As to the crime or number of crimes committed by the appellant, we agree with the prosecution that each and everyone of them committed and are guilty of four crimes of rape. Each defendant is responsible, not only for the act of rape committed personally by him, but also for the rape committed by the others, because each one of them cooperated in the consummation of the rape committed by “the others, by acts without which it could not have been accomplished. The Supreme Court of Spain, in a sentence dated March 10, 1897, and published in the Spanish Official Gazette of April 10th of the same year, held that a person who throws the offended party to the ground and holds her while another is having a sexual intercourse with her, is a co-principal of the crime of rape.
Besides, from the acts performed by the defendants from the time they arrived at Consolacion’s house to the consummation of the offenses of rape on her person by each and everyone of them, it clearly appears that they conspired together to rape their victim, and therefore each one is responsible not only of the rape committed personally by him, but also for that committed by the others, because each sexual intercourse had, through force, by each one of the defendants with the offended party was consummated separately and independently from that had by the others, for which each and every one is also responsible because of the conspiracy. The Supreme Court of Spain, in a sentence of March 15, I898 (Hidalgo, Vol. I, p. 107), held that a person who has executed acts of lasciviousness upon a young girl on three occasions: once in her house, another on the morning, and the last act in the afternoon of the next day, nust bo penalized as guilty of three crimes of lasciviousness, because each one of the said acts had been committed independently from the others.
In view of all the foregoing, with the Modification that the appellants Molina and Bernardino be declared each guilty of four crines of rape and sentenced, for each one of the offenses, to the indeterminate penalty of from 12 years, of prisión mayor to 20 years of reclusión temporal, to be served in accordance with article 70 of the Revised Penal Code, and that the appellant Villa be dealt with in accordance with the provisions of article 80 of the same Code, the sentence of the lower court is affirmed, with costs against the appellants Molina and Bernardino.
So ordered.
Parás, Actg. C. J., Pablo, Briones, Padilla, and Tuason, JJ., concur.