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PHILIPPINE SUPREME COURT DECISIONS

EN BANC

[G.R. No. L-16234. April 26, 1961. ]

THE PEOPLE OF THE PHILIPPINES, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. MARIANITO FETALVERO and FILADELFO CACHOLA, Defendants-Appellants.

Solicitor General for plaintiffs-appellee.

Floro Crisologo, for Defendants-Appellants.


SYLLABUS


1. CRIMINAL LAW; MURDER; KILLING PERPETRATED AT NIGHT; ACCUSED ARMED WITH PISTOLS; TREACHERY QUALIFIED THE KILLING TO MURDER. — Where the accused, both armed with pistols, successively shot the deceased who was unarmed, at night time, the crime committed is murder, qualified by treachery, the latter absorbing nocturnity and superior strength (People v. Magsalin, 82 Phil., 271 and others).

2. ID.; ID.; "ALIBI" CANNOT PREVAIL OVER POSITIVE IDENTIFICATION OF THE ACCUSED; CIRCUMSTANTIAL EVIDENCE CONFIRMS IDENTIFICATION OF THE ACCUSED. — The positive and spontaneous identification of the accused by the eye-witness, and the circumstance that almost immediately after the killing, the policeman who came to the scene, went to the house of the accused because reports gathered from the scene pointed to appellants as the killers, prevail over the completely unsupported alibi interposed by said accused.


D E C I S I O N


REYES, J.B.L., J.:


Appeal from the decision, dated June 22, 1959, in Criminal Case No. 2235 of the Court of First Instance of Ilocos Sur, finding both accused therein guilty of murder; and sentencing defendant Marianito Fetalvero to an indeterminate penalty of from 17 years and 4 months of reclusion temporal to 20 years of reclusion temporal, and the defendant Filadelfo Cachola, to reclusion perpetua, both with the accessory penalties provided by law; to indemnify, jointly and severally, the heirs of the deceased Ernesto Alquetra in the sum of P6,000.00 without subsidiary imprisonment in case of insolvency; and both to share equally the costs.

The following facts have been established by the evidence: In barrio Capangpangan, Vigan, Ilocos Sur, on February 1, 1955, between 7:00 to 7:30 p.m. and after supper, the deceased Ernesto Alquetra and his ten-year old nephew Enrique Alquetra went down their house to defecate at a vacant lot nearby, a place habitually used by some people in the neighborhood for that purpose. On their way, Ernesto and Enrique met Filomena Alquetra who was going to her grandmother’s house to ask for some rice for her father. Ernesto and Enrique continued to walk, with the latter behind his uncle at about 1
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