FIRST DIVISION
[G.R. No. 213151. April 16, 2018.]
MAXIMO PADILLA y BARNACHIA, petitioner, vs.PEOPLE OF THE PHILIPPINES, respondent.
NOTICE
Sirs/Mesdames :
Please take notice that the Court, First Division, issued a Resolution datedApril 16, 2018which reads as follows: cSEDTC
"G.R. No. 213151 — Maximo Padilla y Barnachia, petitioner, v. People of the Philippines, respondent.
This Court has carefully reviewed the records of this case and accordingly resolved to DENY the instant Petition for Review on Certiorari for failure to show that the Court of Appeals (CA) committed any reversible error in its February 21, 2014 Decision and June 17, 2014 Resolution in CA-G.R. CR No. 35216. The prosecution successfully established the elements of the crime of homicide, which are: "(1) a person was killed; (2) the accused killed [that person] without justifying circumstance; (3) the accused had the intention to kill, which is presumed; and (4) the killing was not attended by any of the qualifying circumstances of murder, or that by of parricide or infanticide." 1 The Certificate of Death 2 of Clarito Guiral (victim) shows that his cause of death is hemorrhagic shock secondary to multiple hack wounds on the head. Maximo Padilla y Barnachia (petitioner) admitted that he inflicted the fatal injuries on the victim. "Intent to kill is a state of mind that the courts can discern only through external manifestations, [which refers to] acts and conduct of the [offender] at the time of the assault and immediately thereafter." 3 In this case, the criminal intent was evident from the relentless manner by which petitioner hacked the victim's head several times with an axe. In the absence of any of the qualifying circumstances of murder, parricide and infanticide, the crime committed by petitioner is homicide.
Petitioner admitted that he authored the killing of the victim, but claimed self-defense, which has the following requisites: "(1) unlawful aggression [on the part of the victim]; (2) reasonable necessity of the means employed to prevent or repel it; and (3) lack of sufficient provocation on the part of the person defending himself." 4
In this case, there was evidence of unlawful aggression by the victim and lack of sufficient provocation on the part of petitioner. However, the prosecution's evidence was insufficient to establish the reasonable necessity of the means to repel the unlawful attack. Records show that at the time of the attack, the victim was already unarmed after he lost possession of the chisel. However, petitioner still used an axe to defend himself. More importantly, he hacked the victim not only once but seven times and inflicted mortal wounds on the victim's head and back. These acts of petitioner evinced an intent to kill, and not just to defend himself or repel the attack. Surely, the means employed by petitioner to repel the attack was not reasonable.
When there is unlawful aggression on the part of the victim and lack of sufficient provocation on the part of the offender but the offender uses means not reasonably necessary to prevent or repel the attack, the latter is entitled only to incomplete self-defense, which should be considered a privileged mitigating circumstance referred to in Article 69 of the Revised Penal Code (RPC). 5
Petitioner's voluntary surrender to the police authorities immediately after killing the victim was correctly considered by the CA in his favour. He still had the opportunity to escape after committing the crime but he refused to do so.
In the crime of homicide, Article 249 of the RPC provides that the imposable punishment is reclusion temporal. With the presence of the privileged mitigating circumstance of incomplete self-defense, the penalty prescribed for homicide, which is reclusion temporal, is reduced two degrees lower to prision correccional. 6 This penalty should be applied in its minimum period, in view of the ordinary mitigating circumstance of voluntary surrender. 7 The range of this period is from six (6) months and one (1) day to two (2) years and four (4) months. Applying the Indeterminate Sentence Law, the penalty next lower in degree is arresto mayor, the range of which is one (1) month and one (1) day to six (6) months. The indeterminate penalty imposed by the CA on petitioner must therefore be modified to one (1) month and one (1) day of arresto mayor, as minimum, to six (6) months and one (1) day of prision correccional, as maximum. SDAaTC
The awards of civil indemnity and moral damages in the amounts of P50,000.00 each were proper and pursuant to current jurisprudence. 8 In lieu of actual damages, temperate damages in the amount of P50,000.00 must be awarded to the heirs of the victim due to the loss suffered, even if the amount cannot be ascertained. 9 An interest at the rate of 6% per annum must also be imposed on all amounts of damages from the date of finality of this Resolution until fully paid.
ACCORDINGLY, the Petition for Review on Certiorari is DENIED. The Court resolved to AFFIRM with further modifications the assailed Decision of the Court of Appeals in CA-G.R. CR No. 35216 in that petitioner Maximo Padilla y Barnachia shall suffer the indeterminate penalty of one (1) month and one (1) day of arresto mayor, as minimum, to six (6) months and one (1) day of prision correccional, as maximum, and that he is ordered to pay P50,000.00 as temperate damages in lieu of actual damages to the heirs of the victim. Moreover, an interest at the rate of 6% per annum must also be imposed on all amounts of damages from the date of finality of this Resolution until fully paid.
SO ORDERED." C.J. Sereno, on leave; J. De Castro designated as Acting Chairperson per Special Order No. 2540 dated February 28, 2018; J. Perlas-Bernabe designated as additional member per October 18, 2017 raffle vice J. Jardeleza who recused due to prior action as Solicitor General.
Very truly yours,
(SGD.) LIBRADA C. BUENAActing Division Clerk of Court
Footnotes
1.Villanueva v. Caparas, 702 Phil. 609, 616 (2013).
2. Records, p. 152.
3.Fantastico v. Malicse, Sr., 750 Phil. 120, 132 (2015).
4.People v. Arbalate, 616 Phil. 221, 229 (2009).
5. Art. 69. Penalty to be imposed when the crime committed is not wholly excusable. — A penalty lower by one or two degrees than that prescribed by law shall be imposed if the deed is not wholly excusable by reason of the lack of some of the conditions required to justify the same or to exempt from criminal liability in the several cases mentioned in articles 11 and 12, provided that the majority of such conditions be present. The courts shall impose the penalty in the period which may be deemed proper, in view of the number and nature of the conditions of exemption present or lacking.
6. See People v. Dorado, 43 Phil. 240, 244-245 (1922) and People v. Lucero, 29 Phil. 160, 162 (1915).
7. Article 64 (2) of the Revised Penal Code provides:
2. When only a mitigating circumstance is present in the commission of the act, they shall imposed the penalty in its minimum period.
8.People v. Jugueta, G.R. No. 202124, April 5, 2016, 788 SCRA 331, 338.
9.Seven Brothers Shipping Corporation v. DMC-Construction Resources, Inc., 748 Phil. 692, 702 (2014).