1. The defendant published an article in his periodical that made injurious claims about the private prosecutor, including accusing him of cowardice and having relations with his family's assassin.
2. The issue is whether the defendant should be punished under Article 458 of the Penal Code or Act No. 277 of the United States Philippine Commission, as the article was published before the new law took effect but the prosecution began after.
3. The court ruled that Article 458 of the Penal Code should apply based on the proviso in Act No. 277 that existing laws remain in effect for pending or existing causes of action. It imposed a penalty of 4 years destierro and a 4,000 pe
1. The defendant published an article in his periodical that made injurious claims about the private prosecutor, including accusing him of cowardice and having relations with his family's assassin.
2. The issue is whether the defendant should be punished under Article 458 of the Penal Code or Act No. 277 of the United States Philippine Commission, as the article was published before the new law took effect but the prosecution began after.
3. The court ruled that Article 458 of the Penal Code should apply based on the proviso in Act No. 277 that existing laws remain in effect for pending or existing causes of action. It imposed a penalty of 4 years destierro and a 4,000 pe
1. The defendant published an article in his periodical that made injurious claims about the private prosecutor, including accusing him of cowardice and having relations with his family's assassin.
2. The issue is whether the defendant should be punished under Article 458 of the Penal Code or Act No. 277 of the United States Philippine Commission, as the article was published before the new law took effect but the prosecution began after.
3. The court ruled that Article 458 of the Penal Code should apply based on the proviso in Act No. 277 that existing laws remain in effect for pending or existing causes of action. It imposed a penalty of 4 years destierro and a 4,000 pe
1. The defendant published an article in his periodical that made injurious claims about the private prosecutor, including accusing him of cowardice and having relations with his family's assassin.
2. The issue is whether the defendant should be punished under Article 458 of the Penal Code or Act No. 277 of the United States Philippine Commission, as the article was published before the new law took effect but the prosecution began after.
3. The court ruled that Article 458 of the Penal Code should apply based on the proviso in Act No. 277 that existing laws remain in effect for pending or existing causes of action. It imposed a penalty of 4 years destierro and a 4,000 pe
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Tavera v.
Valdez 1 Phil 468 Prospectivity Facts: The defendant is the editor of Miau, a periodical published and circulated in Manila, and that an article containing the alleged injurious matter was published in the issue of that periodical of September 15, 1901. The article is couched throughout in grossly abusive language, and in terms not capable of being misunderstood; charges the private prosecutor, who had been then recently appointed a member of the United States Philippine Commission, with having displayed cowardice at the time of the murder of his mother and sister and with having subsequently entered into intimate political relations with the assassin. The article contains other statements and imputations of a derogatory character. Article 458 of the Penal Code provides that "injurias graves, put into writing and made public [which is the present case] shall be punished with the penalty of destierro in its medium to its maximum degree, and a fine of from 625 to 6,250 pesetas." Act No. 277 of the United States Philippine Commission "defining the law of libel." etc., and reforming the preexisting Spanish law on the subject of calumnia and injurias affixes to the offense of publishing a libel as defined in the act the punishment of "a fine not exceeding $2,000 or imprisonment for not exceeding one year, or both." o Section 13 of the same act provides as follows: "All laws and parts of laws now in force, so far as the same may be in conflict herewith, are hereby repealed: Provided, That nothing herein contained shall operate as a repeal of existing laws in so far as they are applicable to pending actions or existing causes of action, but as to such causes of action or pending actions existing laws shall remain in full force and effect." o This act went into effect October 24, 1901, subsequent to the publication of the article in question, and during the pendency of the prosecution.
Issue: Whether the accused shall be punished under Article 458 of the Penal Code or Act No. 277 of the United States Philippine Commission. Ruling: The result, then, is that the penalty prescribed by article 458, paragraph 1, of the Penal Code should be applied in its medium grade, and in view of all the circumstances of the case we fix the penalty as four years of destierro and a fine of 4,000 pesetas, with subsidiary liability to one day's banishment for every 12 pesetas not paid, and the costs of both instances. The judgment of the court below will be modified in accordance with this opinion, and the record will be returned to that court for the execution of the sentence as thus modified. So ordered. Ratio: By article 22 of the Penal Code "Penal laws shall have a retroactive effect in so far as they favor the person guilty of a crime of misdemeanor," etc. In so doing we think the court overlooked or improperly construed the proviso in the section of Act No. 277, above cited, by virtue of which the previously existing law on the subject covered by the act is left intact in all its parts as respects pending actions or existing causes of action.
Frank Morgan v. James Tice, Dennis Whitt, Individually and in His Official Capacity and the Town of Lake Park, Frank Morgan v. Dennis Whitt, Individually and in His Official Capacity and the Town of Lake Park, 862 F.2d 1495, 11th Cir. (1989)
