[ G.R. No. L-4164. December 12, 1952 ] 92 Phil. 310
[ G.R. No. L-4164. December 12, 1952 ]
IN THE MATTER OF THE PETITION OF ANTONIO INFANTE FOR THE ISSUANCE OF A WRIT OF HABEAS CORPUS. ANTONIO INFANTE, PETITIONER AND APPELLEE, VS. THE PROVINCIAL WARDEN OF NEGROS OCCIDENTAL, RESPONDENT AND APPELLANT. D E C I S I O N
TUASON, J.:
This was a petition for the writ of habeas corpus filed in the Court of First Instance of Negros Occidental by Antonio Infante, and the petition having been granted, the Provincial Fiscal has appealed to this Court.
It appears that the petitioner was convicted of murder and sentenced to 17 years, four months and one day of reclusion temporal, which he commenced to served on June 21, 1927, and that on March 6, 1939, after serving 15 years, 7 months and 11 days, he was granted a conditional pardon and released from imprisonment, the condition being that “he shall not again violate any of the penal laws of the Philippines.”
On April 25, 1949, Infante was found guilty by the Municipal Court of Bacolod City of driving a jeep without a license and sentenced to pay a fine of P10 with subsidiary imprisonment in case of insolvency. On July 13, 1950, “by virtue of the authority conferred upon his Excellency, the President, by section 64 (i) of the Revised Administrative Code,” the Executive Secretary ordered Infante re-arrested and recommitted to the custody of the Director of Prisons, Muntinlupa, Rizal, for breach of the condition of the aforesaid pardon.
It was the main contention of the petitioner that section 64 (i) of the Revised Administrative Code upon which he was ordered reincarcerated, had been abrogated, and he was sustained by the court below.
Since this appeal was taken, this Court has handed down a decision (Sales vs. Director of Prisons* (48 Off. Gaz., 560) in which these rulings were laid down:
“The Revised Penal Code, which was approved on December 8, 1930, contains a repealing clause (article 367), which expressly repeals among other acts sections 102, 2670, 2671, and 2672 of the Administrative Code. It does not repeal section 64 (i) above quoted. On the contrary, Act No. 4103, the Indeterminate Sentence Law, which is subsequent to the Revised Penal Code, in its section 9 expressly preserves the authority conferred upon the President by section 64 (i) of the Revised Administrative Code.
“The legislative intent is clear, therefore, to preserve the power of the President to authorize the arrest and reincarceration of any person who violates the condition or conditions of his pardon notwithstanding the enactment of article 159 of the Revised Penal Code. In this connection, we observe that section 64 (i) of the Administrative Code and article 159 of the Revised Penal Code are but a reiteration of Acts Nos. 1524 and 1561, under which a violator of a conditional pardon was liable to suffer and to serve the unexpired portion of the original sentence.
“We are of the opinion that article 159 of the Revised Penal Code, which penalizes violation of a conditional pardon as an offense, and the power vested in the President by section 64 (i) of the Revised Administrative Code to authorize the recommitment to prison of a violator of a conditional pardon to serve the unexpired portion of his original sentence, can stand together and that the proceeding under one provision does not necessarily preclude action under the other. * * * "
The second ground of the petition was that the remitted penalty for which the petitioner had been recommitted to jail—one year and 11 days—had prescribed. This contention was also sustained in the appealed decision. Said the Court:
“Segun el articulo 92 del Codigo Penal Revisado, la pena de un (1) ano y once (11) dias que corresponde a la pena de prision correccional, prescribe a los diez (10) años.
“Por manera que, habiendo transcurrido mas de diez (10) anos la respcnsabilidad criminal del solicitante proviniente de la infraccion de su indulto bajo condicion, ha prescrito con exceso.”
The contention is not well taken. According to article 93 of the Revised Penal Code the period of prescription of penalties commences to run from the date when the culprit should evade the service of his sentence. It is evident from this provision that evasion of the sentence is an essential element of prescription. There has been no such evasion in this case. Even if there had been one and prescription were to be applied, its basis would have to be the evasion of the unserved sentence, and computation could not have started earlier than the date of the order for the prisoner’s rearrest.
We think, however, that the condition of the pardon which the prisoner was charged with having breached was no longer operative when he committed a violation of the Motor Vehicle Law.
Pardon is an act of grace, and there is general agreement that limitations upon its operation should be strictly construed (46 C. J. 1202); so that, where a conditional pardon is susceptible of more than one interpretation, it is to be construed most favorably to the grantee. (39 Am. Jur., 564.) Thus, in Huff vs. Dyer, 40 Ohio C. C. 595, 5. L R A , N S, Note 1064), it was held that the duration of the conditions subsequent, annexed to a pardon, would be limited to the period of the prisoner’s sentence unless an intention to extend it beyond that time was manifest from the nature of the condition or the language in which it was imposed. In that case, the prisoner was discharged on habeas corpus because the term of the pardon in question did not, in the opinion of the court, imply that it was contemplated to have the condition operate beyond the term of his sentence. The herein petitioner’s pardon, it will be noted, does not state the time within which the conditions thereof were to be performed or observed. In adopting, which we hereby do, the rule of strict construction, we take into account, besides the benevolent nature of the pardon, the fact that the general run of prisoners are unlettered or at least unfamiliar with the intricacies and legal implications of conditions subsequent imposed in a pardon.
There are courts which have gone so far as to hold, not without plausible argument, that no conditions can be attached to a pardon that are to extend after the expiration of the term for which the prisoner was sentenced, although this view is not shared by the weight of authority. (39 Am., Jur. 564, 567; 46 C. J. 1201.)
Unless the petitioner’s pardon be construed as above suggested, the same, instead of an act of mercy, would become an act of oppression and injustice. We can not believe that in exchange for the remission of a small fraction of the prisoner’s penalty it was in the Executive’s mind to keep hanging over his (prisoner’s) head during the rest of his life the threat of recommitment and/or prosecution for any slight misdemeanor such as that which gave rise to the order-under consideration.
There is another angle which militates in favor of a strict construction in the case at bar. Although the penalty remitted has not, in strict law, prescribed, reimprisonment of the petitioner for the remainder of his sentence, more than ten years after he was pardoned, would be repugnant to the weight of reason and the spirit and genius of our penal laws. If a prisoner who has escaped and has given the authorities trouble and caused the State additional expense in the process of recapturing him is granted immunity from punishment after a period of hiding, there is at least as much justification for extending this liberality through strict construction of the pardon to one who, for the same period, has lived and comported as a peaceful and law-abiding citizen.
Not improper to consider in this connection is the circumstance that the prisoner’s general conduct during his long confinement had been “excellent”, which had merited his classification as a trustee or penal colonist, and that his release before the complete extinguishment of his sentence could have been intended as a reward for his past exemplary behavior with little or no thought of exacting any return from him in the form of restraint from law violations, for which, after all, there were independent and ample punishments.
The judgment of the lower court is affirmed, without costs.
Pablo, and Labrador, JJ., concur.