1.
ADMISSION AGAINST INTEREST strong evidence, that she made the admission or, admitting
RULE 130, SEC 26
US V CHING PO
GR NO. 7707
JUAN YSMAEL AND CO V HASIM
GR 26247
2. Rule 130, Sec 26 and Sec 33
People vs. Lorenzo
240 SCRA 624
January 26, 1995
FACTS: Agapito Lorenzo and accused Dolores Lorenzo were
spouses. PO1 Dolores Lorenzo, a policewoman immediately
surrendered to Police Eclipse a blood-stained bolo and a fan
knife and told him, "I killed my husband".
The two proceeded to where the victim was. In the presence
and within the hearing of said barangay official,
Policewoman Lorenzo again said, "I'm surrendering because I
killed my husband".
The defense painted another picture of the incident. It's
theory is that it was not Policewoman Lorenzo but a certain
Robert Santos who killed Agapito.
ISSUE: Whether the trial courts characterization of the
appellants declaration that she killed her husband is
an extrajudicial confession?
RULING: Parricide; Admissions and Confessions,
Distinguished.We do not, however, agree with the trial
courts characterization of the appellants declaration that
she killed her husband as an extrajudicial confession. It is only
an admission. It is clear from Sections 26 and 33, Rule 130 of
the Rules of Court that there is a distinction between
an admission and a confession. These sections read as
follows: SEC. 26. Admission of a party.The act, declaration
or omission of a party as to a relevant fact may be given in
evidence against him. * * * SEC. 33. Confession.
The declaration of an accused acknowledging his guilt of the
offense charged, or of any offense necessarily included
therein, may be given in evidence against him. In a
confession, there is an acknowledgment of guilt. Admission is
usually applied in criminal cases to statements of fact by the
accused which do not directly involve an acknowledgment
of guilt of the accused or of the criminal intent to commit the
offense with which he is charged.
An admissible confession or admission which has been duly
proved shifts to the accused the burden of evidence to
disprove, by strong evidence, that he made the admission, or
admitting it, that he is not guilty of the crime.Nevertheless,
whether it was a confession or an admission, it was admissible
against the appellant and, having been duly proved,
together with the other facts and circumstances, the burden
of the evidence was shifted to the appellant to disprove, by
it, to prove that she was not guilty of killing her husband. As
earlier shown, the trial court characterized her story as
palpably a put-up scenario .... [A] story which runs against
the grain of ordinary reality, controverts logic and assails
common sense. The five reasons enumerated by it to
support this conclusion are founded on or are inferred from
facts duly established by the prosecution or are otherwise
solidly based on common experience, logic, and common
sense.
The testimony of the accused is not credible where he
has adopted an attitude of indifference relative to the crime
he is accused of and where he failed to inform the police
authorities and the fiscal during the investigation that it was
not he but somebody else who committed the crime.The
appellants failure to assert, at any part of the entire event,
from the time she went with Eclipse to the police station up to
the time she was committed to jail and even thereafter until
she took the witness stand, that it was not she who killed her
husband only serves to reinforce and strengthen this Courts
respect for the trial courts finding that her story that it was
not she but Robert Santos who did her husband in, is shot.
We find it incredible that a peace officer and a wife of the
victim would not forthwith denounce or reveal the identity of
the assailant if it were true that it was not she who killed her
husband, This Court has held that the testimony of the
accused is not credible where he has adopted an attitude of
indifference relative to the crime he is accused of and where
he failed to inform the police authorities and the fiscal during
the investigation that it was not he but somebody else who
committed the murder.
Circumstantial Evidence; An accused could be
convicted based on circumstantial evidence where the
circumstances constitute an unbroken chain which leads to
one fair and reasonable conclusion that points to the
accused to the exclusion of all others as the guilty person.
Even granting for the sake of argument that the appellant
only surrendered a blood-stained bolo and a fan knife but
did not admit that she killed her husband, we find in this case
several circumstances whose concordant combination and
cumulative effect point to the appellant, to the exclusion of
all others, as the guilty party. These circumstances constitute
an unbroken chain which leads to one fair and reasonable
conclusion that points to the appellant, to the exclusion of all
others, as the guilty person. The requirements then of Section
4, Rule 133 of the Rules of Court on the sufficiency of
circumstantial evidence to convict the appellant are present.
CMS LOGGING V CA
GR 41420
3. CONCEPT OF SELF-SERVING EVIDENCE
NDC V WORKSMENS COMPENSATION
GR NO. L-21724
4. ADMISSION BY CONDUCT
1
PEOPLE V SOPE (1946)
FACTS: Dimalanta, Sope and Cruz were charged with
robbery. The CFI found them guilty.
The testimony of Juliana Chan stated that:
When she was on her way home at 6pm, a calesa stopped in
front of her. From the calesa, came down Sope and Cruz.
Sope pointed a revolver at her and Cruz poked a hard object
at her back, while Dimalanta remained in the calesa.
Cruz and Dimalanta pretended to be peace officers and
that she was found violation the law unlawfully dealing in US
Army goods. They stopped at Victory Cafe Dimalanta
and Cruz asked her to have coffee with them, yet still
threatening her to give them money.
She gave P200. She reported the incident so the 3 of them
were arrested.
She claims that Dimalantas lawyer (Atty. VEGA) offered to
settle the case by paying back P200 on the condition that
she would not testify against Dimalanta because she did not
really see him among those who held her up anyway. She
turned this down.
Atty. RESURECION (also in behalf of Dimalanta) managed to
pay her P120
Dimalanta did not appeal.
Sope and Cruz appealed contending:
Their guilt beyond reasonable doubt was not proven
That she was actually carrying contraband items and
for fear of discovery, her husband fled the scene and
did not come back for her (the SC, in the ratio, seem
to connote that they testified this during the trial)
Her testimony is inconsistent and contradict each
other. The CFI convicted them on the basis of her
lone testimony
By what she testified, it should have been bribery not
robbery!
OSG CONTENDS: repeated negotiations for the dropping of
the case is an admission on the part of the conspirator
Dimalanta.
ISSUE: Whether they were guilty beyond reasonable doubt?
YES!
DISPOSITIVE: Conviction.
Contradictions and inconsistencies of the principal witness
are not serious enough to affect her credibility. The trial judge
had opportunity to observe her demeanor while on the stand
and gave it full weight and credit as against those of the
appellants. It was duly established that their lawyers
managed to negotiate the dropping of the case by paying
the amount allegedly taken from her
Admission by conduct in this case:
The repeated offer of a conspirator constitutes a strong
indication and an implied admission of guilt of said
conspirator and the 2 accused in this case.
Re: It is not bribery, it is robbery! Prosecutor was right in
charging the accused of Robbery.
They pretended to be peace officers and employed threats
and intimidation to obtain P200, this is obviously robbery
Although it seems true what the appellants testified that
Juliana Chua was carrying a bundle containing contraband
and for fear of discovery her husband ran away and did not
come back, there was no evidence regarding said
contraband other than the testimony of the accused WHICH
IS NOT POSITIVE NOR CONVINCING.
Re: Self-serving testimonies
Such testimony coming as it does from the accused who
naturally want to exculpate themselves, cannot be regarded
as free from bias and desire to so intensify the details thereof
as to suit their case.
The disappearance of the husband does nothing to
unfavorable to the prosecution because he might have gone
to a policeman
PEOPLE V OCAMPO
GR NO. 80262
5. ADMISSION BY DECLARATION
SISON V AMBALADA
FACTS: Julian Ambalada and Modesta Afable lived together
as husband and wife from 1870 until July 30, 1886, when
Modesta Afable died. During their union, as Ambalada
himself testified at the trial, eight children were born to them,
of whom Maria Ambalada alone survived her mother. This
Maria married Sancho Sison on September 19, 1890, having
three children, Vicente, Maria Consolacin, and Conrado, all
surnamed Sison.
These three grandchildren of Ambalada and Af able
have instituted the present suit against Julian Ambalada
seeking liquidation of the estate belonging to the conjugal
partnership between Julian Ambalada and Modesta Af able,
and partition of the property constituting it, so that to them
might be adjudicated the half of its products belonging to
the portion of the spouse who died first, Modesta Afable. For
this purpose the plaintiffs enumerate in their complaint six
parcels of land as constituting the conjugal partnership
property mentioned.
The defendant Julian Ambalada denies the existence of the
conjugal partnership he is said to have had with Modesta
Afable, to whom, he avers, he was never legally married. He
acknowledges in his written answer that he had had by
Modesta Afable among other children (four altogether
enumerated in the instrument) Maria Ambalada, who, he
says was born on September 11, 1875, and died on
2
November 12, 1902, leaving the plaintiffs as her sole
descendants.
HELD: Whatever may have been the proof required by the
legislation prior to the Civil Code, and that required by it,
which requirements were not put into force, it is a fact that in
Act No. 190, by which the courts must be governed, there
exists the presumption of law that a man and woman who
are living together as husband and wife have entered into a
legal contract of marriage. (Code Civ. Proc., sec. 334, No.
28.)
LACK or RECORD.The mere absence of the record of the
marriage in the books of the church in which the marriage
took place does not destroy that presumption, when the
husband himself acknowledges, and so testifies at the trial,
that he and the woman to whom he was united from 1870 to
July 30, 1886, lived continuously as husband and wife, and
were regarded as such by their own parents and by public
opinion, it being publicly known -in the town in which they
lived that said woman was his lawful wife, sharing in all his
titles; and when they had during this existence as husband
and wife eight legitimate children, who were regarded by
everybody as their children.
EVIDENCE.The legal presumption is further corroborated by
competent parol evidence, which in the present case
isunanimous and supports the claim with reference to the
performance of the marriage and to other points regarding
the fact, not the least of which are acts of the husband
himself, who in various documents stated that he was married
during the time he lived with the woman and an element of
proof exists in writing in various public and official instruments.
PEOPLE VS. YATCO
FACTS:
1. Juan Consunji, Alfonso Panganiban, and another
whose identity is still unknown, were charged with
having conspired together in the murder of one Jose
Ramos.
2. During the progress of the trial, counsel for the
defendant Panganiban interposed a general
objection to any evidence on such confession made
by defendant consunji on the ground that it was
hearsay and therefore incompetent as against the
other accused Panganiban.
3. The lower court ordered the exclusion of the
objected evidence but on a different ground which
is the prosecution could not be permitted to
introduce the confessions of defendants Juan
Consunji and Alfonso Panganiban to prove
conspiracy between them, without prior proof of
such conspiracy by a number of definite acts,
conditions, and circumstances.
4. OSG filed a petition for cetiorari before the SC for the
review and annulment of the lower Court's order
completely excluding any evidence on the
extrajudicial confessions of the accused Juan
Consunji and Alfonso Panganiban without prior proof
of conspiracy.
Issue: WON the lower court is correct in excluding the
prosecutionss evidence (extra-judicial confession by
Consunji)?
No. We believe that the lower Court committed a grave
abuse of discretion in ordering the complete exclusion of the
prosecution's evidence on the alleged confessions of the
accused Juan Consunji at the stage of the trial when the
ruling was made.
Section 14, Rule 123, Rules of Court, is specific as to the
admissibility of the extrajudicial confession of an accused,
freely and voluntarily made, as evidence against him.
SEC. 14. Confession. The declaration of an accused
expressly acknowledging the truth of his guilt as to the offense
charged, may be given in evidence against him.
Under the rule of multiple admissibility of evidence, even if
Consunji's confession may not be competent as against his
co-accused Panganiban, being hearsay as to the latter, or to
prove conspiracy between them without the conspiracy
being established by other evidence, the confession of
Consunji was, nevertheless, admissible as evidence of the
declarant's own guilt and should be admitted.
WON section 12 of Rule 123 is applicable in the case at bar?
No. The rule cited by the Court below in support of its
exclusion of the proffered evidence is Sec. 12 of Rule 123,
providing that the act or declaration of a conspirator relating
to the conspiracy and during its existence may be given in
evidence against the co-conspirator after the conspiracy is
shown by evidence other than such act or declaration.
Manifestly, the rule refers to statements made by one
conspirator during the pendency of the unlawful
enterprises("during its existence") and in furtherance of its
object, and not to a confession made, as in this case, long
after the conspiracy had been brought to an end.
Besides, the prosecution had not yet offered the confessions
to prove conspiracy between the two accused, nor as
evidence against both of them. In fact, the alleged
confessions (both in writing and in tape recordings) had not
yet even been identified, much less formally offered in
evidence. For all we know, the prosecution might still be able
to adduce other proof of conspiracy between Consunji and
Panganiban before their confessions are formally offered in
evidence. Assuming, therefore, that section 12 of Rule 123
also applies to the confessions in question, it was premature
for the respondent Court to exclude them completely on the
ground that there was no prior proof of conspiracy.
WON the court has the power to disregard evidence?
(Related to the topic Objections)
The court does not have the said power.
3
The exclusion of the proferred confessions was not made on
the basis of the objection interposed by Panganiban's
counsel, but upon an altogether different ground, which the
Court issued motu proprio. Panganiban's counsel objected to
Consunji's confession as evidence of the guilt of the other
accused Panganiban, on the ground that it was hearsay as
to the latter. But the Court, instead of ruling on this objection,
put up its own objection to the confessions that it could not
be admitted to prove conspiracy between Consunji and
Panganiban without prior evidence of such conspiracy by a
number of indefinite acts, conditions, circumstances, etc.
and completely excluded the confessions on that ground. By
so doing, the Court overlooked that the right to object is a
mere privilege which the parties may waive; and if the
ground for objection is known and not reasonably made, the
objection is deemed waived and the Court has no power, on
its own motion, to disregard the evidence.
6. ADMISSION BY SILENCE (QUI TACET CONSENTIRE
VIDETUR)
RULE 130, SEC 32
PEOPLE V PARAGSA
GR NO. L-44060
ISSUE: whether the trial court committed a reversible error in
finding that there was conspiracy between the accused-
appellant and his co-accused.
HELD: Criminal Law; Conspiracy; When one is considered a
party to a conspiracy.One is considered a party to a
conspiracy when he intentionally participates in an act or
deed with a view to the furtherance of common design and
purpose. There must be unity of purpose and unity in the
execution of the unlawful objective. Mere knowledge,
acquiescense, or approval of the act, without cooperation or
agreement to cooperate, is not enough. Moreover,
conspiracy implies concept of design but not participation in
every detail of execution.
Same; Same; Liability ofthe conspirator.When the
conspiracy to commit the crime of robbery was conclusively
shown by the concerted acts of the accused, and homicide
was committed as a consequence thereof all those who
participated are liable as principals in the robbery with
homicide, although they did not actually take part in the
homicide, unless it appears that they attempted to prevent
the killing. The question as to who actually robbed or who
actually killed is of no moment, since all of them would be
held accountable for the crime of robbery with homicide.

7. CO-CONSPIRATORS
RULE 130, SEC 30
PEOPLE V YATCO
GR NO L-9181

PEOPLE V GUEVARRA
GR 12794

PEOPLE V SALVADOR
GR L- 77964

FACTS: Alfredo C. Mabuhay and his girlfriend, as they were

conversing, two male persons approached them. One of
themlater identified as accused-appellant Edgardo
Salvadorheld Susan and pushed her to the ground in a
lying position, while the otherlater identified as accused
Ricardo Manoscadid the same to Alfredo. Manosca then
announced that it was a hold-up as both men poked knives
at their victims. Alfredo readily gave his wallet to Manosca.
Susan, who was being held by Salvador, offered some
resistance out of fear.

Thereafter, Some construction workers in the vicinity rescued

Alfredo who told them that he and his girlfriend were
attacked and robbed. The workers summoned the police
who arrived shortly and brought Alfredo to the Ospital ng
Maynila for treatment of his wounds. The peace officers told
Alfredo that his girlfriend was already dead.

The accused-appellant and his co-accused Ricardo

Manosca, guilty beyond reasonable doubt of the special
complex crime of robbery with homicide and physical injuries.