EN BANC

[G.R. No. 146099. April 30, 2003.]

PEOPLE OF THE PHILIPPINES , appellee, vs . JIMMEL SANIDAD,

PONCE MANUEL alias PAMBONG, JOHN DOE (at large) and PETER
DOE (at large) , accused.

JIMMEL SANIDAD and PONCE MANUEL alias PAMBONG , appellants.

The Solicitor General for plaintiff-appellee.

Blanco Law Office for accused-appellants.

SYNOPSIS

Appellants were convicted of the complex crime of murder of one Rolando Tugadi
and of multiple attempted murder of the passengers of the jeepney they ambushed and
were sentenced to death. The Supreme Court upheld their conviction on appeal, ruling: that
the trial court's ndings on the witnesses' credibility are generally upheld on appeal; that
the supposed inconsistent and inaccurate details in the testimonies of prosecution
witnesses were relatively trivial; that crime victims cannot be expected to recall with exact
precision the minutiae of the incident; that surviving passengers positively identi ed
appellants as the malefactors; and that fear of reprisal or the individual manner by which
individuals react when confronted by a gruesome event as to place the viewer in a state of
shock for sometime, is a valid excuse for the temporary silence of witnesses. The death
penalty was affirmed.

SYLLABUS

1. REMEDIAL LAW; EVIDENCE; CREDIBILITY OF WITNESSES; FACTUAL

FINDINGS OF TRIAL COURT THEREON ARE GENERALLY UPHELD ON APPEAL; CASE AT
BAR. — It is axiomatic that the assessment on the credibility of witnesses is a function
best discharged by the trial court which is in a better position to determine con icting
testimonies after having heard the witnesses, and observed their deportment and manner
of testifying. This Court will not interfere with the trial court's ndings on the credibility of
witnesses unless those ndings are arbitrary, or facts and circumstances of weight and
in uence have been overlooked, misunderstood or misapplied by the judge which, if
considered, would have affected the outcome of the case. None of the exceptions have
been shown to exist in the instant case.
2. ID.; ID.; ID.; CRIME VICTIMS NOT EXPECTED TO RECALL WITH EXACT
PRECISION THE MINUTIAE OF THE INCIDENT; CASE AT BAR. — [W]e nd that the
supposed inconsistent and inaccurate details are relatively trivial and do not affect the
veracity of the testimonies of Marlon Tugadi, Jun Quipay, Pepito Tugadi and Raymund
Fontanilla. Indeed, inconsistencies and inaccuracies in the testimonies of witnesses which
refer to minor and insigni cant details do not destroy their credibility. Such minor
inconsistencies and inaccuracies even manifest truthfulness and candor, and erase any
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 suspicion of a rehearsed testimony. . . Verily, victims of crimes cannot be expected to
recall with exact precision the minutiae of the incident. Human memory is not as unerring
as a photograph. Different persons having different re exes produce varying reactions,
impressions, perceptions and recollections. Their physical, mental and emotional
conditions may have also affected the recall of the details of the incident.aAHDIc

3. ID.; ID.; ALIBI; CANNOT PREVAIL OVER THE POSITIVE IDENTIFICATION OF

THE ACCUSED AS THE MALEFACTORS; CASE AT BAR. — Signi cantly; the victims
positively identi ed accused-appellants Jimmel Sanidad and Ponce Manuel in open court
as among those who ambushed them in the early morning of 17 January 1999 at the Abra-
Cervantes Road, which led to the death of Rolando Tugadi. Victims Jun Quipay, Pepito
Tugadi and Raymund Fontanilla were likewise asked during the trial to identify the
malefactors who staged the ambush, and they all pointed to Jimmel Sanidad and Ponce
Manuel. It must be stressed that the incidents prior to, during and after the attack provided
the victims with more than su cient opportunity to identify accused-appellants as the
perpetrators of the dastardly acts. The victims had a drinking session with their assailants
that lasted for many hours. During the ambush itself, the headlights of the victims' vehicle
illuminated the assailants. Again, when the vehicle burst into ames after the ambush, the
surroundings were bathed in light including the assailants who were standing nearby, thus
enabling the victims to have a good look at their faces. These circumstances, coupled with
the victims' familiarity with accused-appellants, rendered a mistaken identi cation very
unlikely. The general denial and alibi of the defense are too lame to be legally accepted as
true, especially when measured up against the positive identi cation of accused-
appellants. The doctrine is well-settled that denial and alibi are the weakest of all defenses
as they are easy to concoct and fabricate but di cult to disprove. Denial and alibi should
be rejected when the identities of accused-appellants are su ciently and positively
established by eyewitnesses to the crime.
4. ID.; ID.; ID.; PHYSICAL IMPOSSIBILITY FOR ACCUSED TO BE AT THE CRIME
SCENE AT THE TIME OF THE INCIDENT; CASE AT BAR. — For alibi to be credible, the
accused must not only prove his presence at another place at the time of the commission
of the offense but must also demonstrate that it would be physically impossible for him to
be at the locus criminis at that time. In the case at bar, accused-appellants claimed that
they were in their respective houses at the time of the ambush. But the record shows that
the house of accused-appellant Jimmel Sanidad's sister where he was staying in Sitio Bio,
San Isidro, Lagangilang, Abra, is but a mere six (6) to seven (7)-minute walk, or about 700
meters, from the crime scene. While accused-appellant Ponce Manuel lived "in the same
place, (in) the same community."
5. ID.; ID,; CREDIBILITY OF WITNESSES; DELAY IN REPORTING A CRIME, WHEN
SATISFACTORILY EXPLAINED, IS NOT A SETBACK TO THE EVIDENTIARY VALUE OF THE
TESTIMONY; CASE AT BAR. — Delay in reporting a crime to the authorities is not an
uncommon phenomenon. The rule is, delay by a witness in divulging what he or she knows
about a crime is not by itself a setback to the evidentiary value of such witness' testimony,
where the delay is su ciently justi ed by any acceptable explanation. Thus, a well-founded
fear of reprisal or the individual manner by which individuals react when confronted by a
gruesome event as to place the viewer in a state of shock for sometime, is a valid excuse
for the temporary silence of witnesses.
6. ID.; ID.; CONSPIRACY; CONCERTED ACTIONS OF ACCUSED CLEARLY
EVINCED CONSPIRACY; CASE AT BAR. — Conspiracy and treachery, as the trial court
found, attended the commission of the crime. For collective responsibility to be
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 established, it is not necessary that conspiracy be proved by direct evidence of a prior
agreement to commit the crime. Only rarely would such an agreement be demonstrable
because criminal undertakings, in the nature of things, are rarely documented by written
agreements. The concerted actions of accused-appellants, however, clearly evinced
conspiracy. Their simultaneous acts of peppering the victims' jeepney with bullets, and
thereafter chasing the vehicle to prevent its escape, were undoubtedly in pursuance of a
common felonious design. All these su ciently prove beyond reasonable doubt that they
conspired to consummate the killing of the victim. caCSDT

7. CRIMINAL LAW; QUALIFYING CIRCUMSTANCES; TREACHERY; FIRING

SUCCESSIVE SHOTS WITHOUT ALLOWING VICTIMS AN OPPORTUNITY TO PUT UP A
DECENT DEFENSE IS A TREACHEROUS ATTACK. — On treachery, the deadly successive
shots of accused-appellants did not allow the victims any opportunity to put up a decent
defense. The victims were like a ock of sheep waylaid and ferociously attacked by a pack
of ravening wolves. While the victims might have realized a possible danger to their
persons when they saw accused-appellants, all armed and positioned in a mango tree
ahead of them, the attack was executed in such a vicious manner as to make the defense,
not to say a counter-attack, virtually impossible.
8. ID.; ATTEMPTED MURDER; WHEN THE VICTIMS HAVE SUCCESSFULLY
DODGED THE HAIL OF GUNFIRE AND ESCAPED, THE ACCUSED ARE NONETHELESS
GUILTY OF ATTEMPTED MURDER. — Under the circumstances, it is plain to us that
accused-appellants had murder in their hearts when they waylaid their unwary victims.
They must consequently be held liable for their acts. Insofar as victims Marlon Tugadi, Jun
Quipay, Raymund Fontanilla, Pepito Tugadi, Del n Tadeo, Ricardo Tadeo, Edwin Tumalip,
Bobby Velasquez and Dennis Balueg are concerned, although they barely escaped the
ambush with super cial injuries does not alter the nature of accused-appellants'
participation in the crime of murder except that not one of them having suffered fatal
injuries which could have resulted in their death, accused-appellants should only be held
guilty of attempted murder. Accused-appellants had commenced their criminal scheme to
liquidate all the victims directly by overt acts, but were unable to perform all the acts of
execution that would have brought about their death by reason of some cause other than
their own spontaneous desistance, that is, the victims successfully dodged the hail of
gunfire and escaped.
9. ID.; COMPLEX CRIME; WHERE A CONSPIRACY ANIMATES SEVERAL
REASONS WITH A SINGLE PURPOSE, THEIR INDIVIDUAL ACTS DONE IN PURSUANCE OF
THAT PURPOSE GIVE RISE TO A SINGLE COMPLEX OFFENSE. — We fully agree with the
lower court that the instant case comes within the purview of Art. 48 of The Revised Penal
Code which, speaking of complex crimes, provides that when "a single act constitutes two
or more grave or less grave felonies, or when an offense is a necessary means for
committing the other, the penalty for the most serious crime shall be imposed in its
maximum period." In a complex crime, although two or more crimes are actually
committed, they constitute only one crime in the eyes of the law as well as in the
conscience of the offender. Although several independent acts were performed by the
accused in ring separate shots from their individual rearms, it was not possible to
determine who among them actually killed victim Rolando Tugadi. Moreover, there is no
evidence that accused-appellants intended to re at each and every one of the victims
separately and distinctly from each other. On the contrary, the evidence clearly shows a
single criminal impulse to kill Marlon Tugadi's group as a whole. Thus, one of accused-
appellants exclaimed in frustration after the ambush: "My gosh, we were not able to kill all
of them." Where a conspiracy animates several persons with a single purpose, their
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 individual acts done in pursuance of that purpose are looked upon as a single act, the act
of execution, giving rise to a single complex offense.
cIHSTC

10. ID.; MURDER; PENALTY; CASE AT BAR. — The penalty for the most serious
offense of murder under Art. 248 of The Revised Penal Code as amended by Rep. Act No.
7659 is reclusion perpetua to death. It therefore becomes our painful duty in the instant
case to apply the maximum penalty in accordance with law, and sentence accused-
appellants to death.

DECISION

PER CURIAM : p

CONDEMNED TO DEATH by the trial court on 26 July 2000 1 for the complex crime
of murder and multiple attempted murder, accused-appellants JIMMEL SANIDAD and
PONCE MANUEL alias PAMBONG now seek the reversal of their conviction as we review
automatically the judgment pursuant to Sec. 22, Rep. Act No. 7659, amending Art. 47 of
The Revised Penal Code. CcaDHT

On 16 January 1999 at around ve o'clock in the afternoon Marlon Tugadi, Jun

Quipay, Raymund Fontanilla, Rolando Tugadi, Pepito Tugadi, Del n Tadeo, Ricardo Tadeo,
Edwin Tumalip, Bobby Velasquez and Dennis Balueg left Budac, Tagum, Abra, on board a
passenger jeepney driven by Del n Tadeo to attend a barangay esta in the neighboring
town of Lagangilang, Abra. When they arrived they joined the residents in a drinking spree
that lasted up to the wee hours the following morning. In the course of their conviviality,
accused-appellants Jimmel Sanidad, Ponce Manuel alias Pambong and several other
residents of Lagangilang joined them in drinking. 2 Marlon Tugadi and accused Jimmel
Sanidad were drinking buddies and members of the CAFGU before then. 3
On 17 January 1999 at about four o'clock in the morning Jimmel Sanidad and his
companions nished drinking and left. 4 Shortly after, the group of Marlon Tugadi also
stopped drinking and headed home for Budac, Tagum, Abra, boarding the same jeepney
driven by Del n Tadeo. Seated next to Del n in front were Ricardo Tadeo and Rolando
Tugadi, while on the left rear seat were Marlon Tugadi, Jun Quipay and Raymund Fontanilla.
Seated on the right rear seat were Bobby Velasquez, Dennis Balueg, Edwin Tumalip and
Pepito Tugadi. 5
With Del n Tadeo on the wheels the jeepney cruised the rough and gravelly dirt road
of Abra-Cervantes with its passengers completely unaware that danger lurked ahead in the
dark and dreary stretch of the road. The jeepney's headlights sharply ablaze and glaring
illuminated the path and radiated towards the lush vegetation of the surrounding
landscape. As the jeepney approached a plantation, its headlights beamed at accused-
appellants Jimmel Sanidad, Ponce Manuel and two (2) other unidenti ed companions who
were positioned next to a mango tree at the left side of the road approximately fteen (15)
meters away. Accused-appellants were armed with an armalite, a .45 caliber pistol and
shotguns with buckshots.
As the jeepney moved closer, the accused in a classic case of ambuscade suddenly
and without warning unleashed a volley of shots at the jeepney. 6 Del n stepped on the gas
in a vain effort to elude their assailants, but they continued ring at the hapless victims.
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 Bullets plowed the side of the vehicle and all the passengers sitting at the back
instinctively ducked on the oor to avoid being hit. The accused pursued the vehicle on
foot and fired at it incessantly until it finally stalled a few meters away. 7
The jeepney was left in shambles. Its tires, headlights and taillights were shattered;
its windshield broken to pieces, and the front and left sides of the vehicle riddled with
bullets. 8 Miraculously, almost all of its passengers, with the exception of Rolando Tugadi,
survived the ambush and suffered only minor injuries. Marlon Tugadi tried to pull his
brother Rolando Tugadi from the vehicle to safety only to realize that he was not only too
heavy, he was already dead. As the pursuing gunmen drew near, Marlon decided to
abandon Rolando and scampered away with the other victims until they reached a bushy
area about fifteen (15) meters away from the vehicle. 9
Meanwhile, the accused caught up with the crippled jeepney. Moments later, re
engulfed it. The radiant ames of the burning vehicle illuminated the malefactors who
stood nearby and watched the blaze. It could not be determined whether the accused
purposely set the vehicle on re or the fuel tank was hit during the shooting that ignited the
re. Marlon Tugadi and Pepito Tugadi later heard one of the unidenti ed companions of
accused-appellant Sanidad say to him: "My gosh, we were not able to kill all of them." 1 0
Thereafter, the accused left the scene, ring their guns indiscriminately into the air as they
walked away. 1 1
Apparently shaken and dazed by their terrifying ordeal, the victims hid in a culvert on
the side of the road and did not come out until the police arrived at the scene. The police
doused the burning vehicle with water and found the charred remains of Rolando Tugadi.
1 2 Likewise retrieved at the crime scene were eighty- ve (85) empty shells from an
armalite ri e, two (2) empty shells from a .45 caliber pistol, and a slug from another .45
caliber pistol. 1 3
Dr. Maria L. Dickenson, Medico-Legal O cer of Lagangilang, Abra, conducted an
autopsy on Rolando Tugadi immediately after the incident. Her postmortem ndings were:
(a) carbonization of the body, (b) long bones of lower extremities still burning, (c) presence
of lower half portion of charred skull, (d) presence of left charred thigh, (e) presence of
right charred thigh, and (f) presence of upper third of charred right leg. Cause of death:
burns, generalized, 6th degree. 1 4
An Information for murder with multiple attempted murder and malicious mischief
was led against Jimmel Sanidad, Ponce Manuel alias Pambong , John Doe and Peter Doe.
The defense of the accused rested on bare denial and alibi. They disclaimed liability for the
ambush insisting that at about 4:00 to 4:30 in the morning of 17 January 1999 they were
already at home sleeping when they heard the clatter of gun re and an explosion nearby.
But the trial court disregarded the defense interposed by the accused and forthwith
convicted them of the complex crime of murder and multiple attempted murder, and
sentenced them to death.
In this mandatory review, the legal questions raised essentially centered on: first, the
credibility of witnesses; and, second, the sufficiency of the prosecution evidence.
We a rm the conviction. We nd that the prosecution succeeded overwhelmingly in
meeting the quantum of proof required to overturn the constitutional presumption of
innocence. The trial court properly convicted accused-appellants on the basis of the
credible and uncontroverted testimonies of the victims and other prosecution witnesses.
EaHATD

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 It is axiomatic that the assessment on the credibility of witnesses is a function best
discharged by the trial court which is in a better position to determine con icting
testimonies after having heard the witnesses, and observed their deportment and manner
of testifying. This Court will not interfere with the trial court's ndings on the credibility of
witnesses unless those ndings are arbitrary, or facts and circumstances of weight and
in uence have been overlooked, misunderstood or misapplied by the judge which, if
considered, would have affected the outcome of the case. 1 5 None of the exceptions have
been shown to exist in the instant case.
Accused-appellants pointed out supposed inconsistencies and inaccuracies in the
testimonies of prosecution witnesses Marlon Tugadi, Jun Quipay, Pepito Tugadi and
Raymund Fontanilla, thus —
. . . ordinary human conduct is very predictable. When confronted with
danger, the rst reaction is to avoid it. But not Jun Quipay, Marlon Tugadi, Pepito
Tugadi and Raymund Fontanilla. While all claimed they have jumped out of the
jeep, they did not run away. Instead they still lingered at about 7–50 meters away
from the jeep. So that they saw the attackers when the jeep exploded. How
remarkable is their depiction of the accused as unafraid of an exploding jeep! The
testimonies of Jun Quipay and Marlon Tugadi cancel each other out. Marlon said
he saw the ambushers come out with guns blazing. Jun said Marlon was lying
down with eyes closed when that moment happened. Again, back to human
nature, Marlon Tugadi and Pepito Tugadi saw with the morning light that their
brother Rolando Tugadi is (sic) no more. A carbonized cadaver he became. And
yet they did not tell the police who did the dastardly acts! How unnatural. And yet
they claimed in court that they positively identi ed the accused at the time of the
ambush. 1 6

After a cursory reading of the transcripts, however, we nd that the supposed

inconsistent and inaccurate details are relatively trivial and do not affect the veracity of the
testimonies of Marlon Tugadi, Jun Quipay, Pepito Tugadi and Raymund Fontanilla. Indeed,
inconsistencies and inaccuracies in the testimonies of witnesses which refer to minor and
insigni cant details do not destroy their credibility. Such minor inconsistencies and
inaccuracies even manifest truthfulness and candor, and erase any suspicion of a
rehearsed testimony. 1 7
At any rate, the ineludible fact remains that Marlon Tugadi, Jun Quipay, Pepito
Tugadi and Raymund Fontanilla were all at the scene of the crime and almost got killed
during the ambush. They were eyewitnesses to the gruesome death of a family member in
the hands of accused-appellants. What is important is that they conveyed to the trial court
what they actually perceived, including those seeming improbabilities, on that fateful day;
and they categorically supplied all the facts necessary for accused-appellants' conviction.
Verily, victims of crimes cannot be expected to recall with exact precision the minutiae of
the incident. Human memory is not as unerring as a photograph. 1 8 Different persons
having different re exes produce varying reactions, impressions, perceptions and
recollections. Their physical, mental and emotional conditions may have also affected the
recall of the details of the incident.
Signi cantly, the victims positively identi ed accused-appellants Jimmel Sanidad
and Ponce Manuel in open court as among those who ambushed them in the early morning
of 17 January 1999 at the Abra-Cervantes Road, which led to the death of Rolando Tugadi.
Quoted hereunder is an excerpt from Marlon Tugadi's testimony —

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 Q: Mr. Witness, do you know one by the name of Jimmel Sanidad?

A: Yes sir.
Q: Will you please focus your eyes around and point to that person Jimmel
Sanidad?
A: (Witness pointed to a man seated at the accused bench and when asked of
his name he answered Jimmel Sanidad.)

Q: Why do you know this accused Jimmel Sanidad Mr. Witness?

A: We were in the same batch in the CAFGU sir.
Q: Aside from being a CAFGU batch member, what else do you know of this
accused Jimmel Sanidad?
A: We sometimes drink together when I go to their place, sir.
Q: How about the other accused Ponce Manuel alias Pambong, again I ask
you to focus your eyes around and point at him and identify him?
A: (Witness pointed to a man seated at the accused bench and when asked of
his name he answered Ponce Manuel). 1 9

Victims Jun Quipay, Pepito Tugadi and Raymund Fontanilla were likewise asked
during the trial to identify the malefactors who staged the ambush, and they all pointed to
Jimmel Sanidad and Ponce Manuel. aEIcHA

It must be stressed that the incidents prior to, during and after the attack provided
the victims with more than su cient opportunity to identify accused-appellants as the
perpetrators of the dastardly acts. The victims had a drinking session with their assailants
that lasted for many hours. During the ambush itself, the headlights of the victims' vehicle
illuminated the assailants. Again, when the vehicle burst into ames after the ambush, the
surroundings were bathed in light including the assailants who were standing nearby, thus
enabling the victims to have a good look at their faces. These circumstances, coupled with
the victims' familiarity with accused-appellants, rendered a mistaken identi cation very
unlikely.
The general denial and alibi of the defense are too lame to be legally accepted as
true, especially when measured up against the positive identi cation of accused-
appellants. The doctrine is well settled that denial and alibi are the weakest of all defenses
as they are easy to concoct and fabricate but di cult to disprove. Denial and alibi should
be rejected when the identities of accused-appellants are su ciently and positively
established by eyewitnesses to the crime.
For alibi to be credible, the accused must not only prove his presence at another
place at the time of the commission of the offense but must also demonstrate that it
would be physically impossible for him to be at the locus criminis at that time. In the case
at bar, accused-appellants claimed that they were in their respective houses at the time of
the ambush. But the record shows that the house of accused-appellant Jimmel Sanidad's
sister where he was staying in Sitio Bio, San Isidro, Lagangilang, Abra, is but a mere six (6)
to seven (7)-minute walk, or about 700 meters, from the crime scene. 2 0 While accused-
appellant Ponce Manuel lived "in the same place, (in) the same community." 2 1
Equally untenable is accused-appellants' assertion that the delay of the victims in
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 identifying their ambushers for more than four (4) weeks points to the conclusion that "all
the survivors of the ambush were really and timely clueless as to who the perpetrators of
the ambush (were)." 2 2
Delay in reporting a crime to the authorities is not an uncommon phenomenon. The
rule is, delay by a witness in divulging what he or she knows about a crime is not by itself a
setback to the evidentiary value of such witness' testimony, where the delay is su ciently
justi ed by any acceptable explanation. Thus, a well-founded fear of reprisal or the
individual manner by which individuals react when confronted by a gruesome event as to
place the viewer in a state of shock for sometime, is a valid excuse for the temporary
silence of witnesses. As correctly observed by the Solicitor General in the present case —
. . . the victims in the instant case were survivors of an extremely violent
incident which in icts severe concomitant psychological stress on them.
Considering also that the survivors were being investigated by the police from
another municipality where the perpetrators not only reside but one of them was
even a member of the CAFGU, it is a natural reaction for the victims not to reveal
that they know the identities of the perpetrators and induce them to take action to
prevent the victims from testifying. . . . Furthermore, Marlon Tugadi insisted to the
police during the investigation that he knew who ambushed them but that he
would talk only after his brother's interment. This hardly quali es as an unusual
behavior. 2 3

Conspiracy and treachery, as the trial court found, attended the commission of the
crime. For collective responsibility to be established, it is not necessary that conspiracy be
proved by direct evidence of a prior agreement to commit the crime. Only rarely would
such an agreement be demonstrable because criminal undertakings, in the nature of
things, are rarely documented by written agreements. The concerted actions of accused-
appellants, however, clearly evinced conspiracy. Their simultaneous acts of peppering the
victims' jeepney with bullets, and thereafter chasing the vehicle to prevent its escape, were
undoubtedly in pursuance of a common felonious design. All these su ciently prove
beyond reasonable doubt that they conspired to consummate the killing of the victim. 2 4
On treachery, the deadly successive shots of accused-appellants did not allow the
victims any opportunity to put up a decent defense. The victims were like a ock of sheep
waylaid and ferociously attacked by a pack of ravening wolves. While the victims might
have realized a possible danger to their persons when they saw accused-appellants, all
armed and positioned in a mango tree ahead of them, the attack was executed in such a
vicious manner as to make the defense, not to say a counter-attack, virtually impossible.
Under the circumstances, it is plain to us that accused-appellants had murder in
their hearts when they waylaid their unwary victims. They must consequently be held liable
for their acts. Insofar as victims Marlon Tugadi, Jun Quipay, Raymund Fontanilla, Pepito
Tugadi, Del n Tadeo, Ricardo Tadeo, Edwin Tumalip, Bobby Velasquez and Dennis Balueg
are concerned, although they barely escaped the ambush with super cial injuries does not
alter the nature of accused-appellants' participation in the crime of murder except that not
one of them having suffered fatal injuries which could have resulted in their death,
accused-appellants should only be held guilty of attempted murder. Accused-appellants
had commenced their criminal scheme to liquidate all the victims directly by overt acts, but
were unable to perform all the acts of execution that would have brought about their death
by reason of some cause other than their own spontaneous desistance, that is, the victims
successfully dodged the hail of gunfire and escaped. EaHATD

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 We fully agree with the lower court that the instant case comes within the purview of
Art. 48 of The Revised Penal Code which, speaking of complex crimes, provides that when
"a single act constitutes two or more grave or less grave felonies, or when an offense is a
necessary means for committing the other, the penalty for the most serious crime shall be
imposed in its maximum period." In a complex crime, although two or more crimes are
actually committed, they constitute only one crime in the eyes of the law as well as in the
conscience of the offender. 2 5
Although several independent acts were performed by the accused in firing separate
shots from their individual rearms, it was not possible to determine who among them
actually killed victim Rolando Tugadi. Moreover, there is no evidence that accused-
appellants intended to re at each and every one of the victims separately and distinctly
from each other. On the contrary, the evidence clearly shows a single criminal impulse to
kill Marlon Tugadi's group as a whole. 2 6 Thus, one of accused-appellants exclaimed in
frustration after the ambush: "My gosh, we were not able to kill all of them." 2 7 Where a
conspiracy animates several persons with a single purpose, their individual acts done in
pursuance of that purpose are looked upon as a single act, the act of execution, giving rise
to a single complex offense. 2 8
The penalty for the most serious offense of murder under Art. 248 of The Revised
Penal Code as amended by Rep. Act No. 7659 is reclusion perpetua to death. It therefore
becomes our painful duty in the instant case to apply the maximum penalty in accordance
with law, and sentence accused-appellants to death.
WHEREFORE, the Decision of the court a quo of 26 July 2000 nding accused-
appellants JIMMEL SANIDAD and PONCE MANUEL alias PAMBONG guilty of the complex
crime of murder and multiple attempted murder and imposing upon them the supreme
penalty of DEATH is AFFIRMED.
Accused-appellants are likewise ordered jointly and severally to: (a) INDEMNIFY the
heirs of the deceased victim Rolando Tugadi in the amount of P50,000.00 as civil
indemnity as well as P50,000.00 as moral damages; and, (b) PAY victim Del n Tadeo the
sum of P50,000.00 for the loss of his jeepney.
In accordance with Art. 83 of The Revised Penal Code, as amended by Sec. 25 of
Rep. Act No. 7659, upon the nality of this Decision, let the records of this case be
forthwith forwarded to Her Excellency the President for the possible exercise of her
pardoning power. ScTIAH

Costs de oficio.
SO ORDERED.
Davide, Jr., C.J., Bellosillo, Puno, Vitug, Panganiban, Ynares-Santiago, Sandoval-
Gutierrez, Carpio, Austria-Martinez, Corona, Carpio-Morales, Callejo, Sr. and Azcuna, JJ.,
concur.
Quisumbing, J., is on official leave.

Footnotes
1. Decision penned by Judge Arturo B. Buenavista, RTC-Br. 2, Bangued, Abra, in Crim. Case
No. 99-344, "People v. Sanidad."
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 2. TSN, 22 March 2000, pp. 8–9.
3. Id., pp. 3–4.
4. Id., 5 April 2000, p. 46.
5. Id., 22 March 2000, pp. 12–13.
6. Id., 22 March 2000, pp. 10–13, 35–37.
7. Id., pp. 40–41.
8. See Exhs. "N-2" to "N-4", "N-10", to "N-11"; Records, pp. 184–187.
9. TSN, 22 March 2000, p. 14.
10. Id., pp. 15–16.
11. Id., pp. 16–17.
12. Exh. "N-1"; Records, p. 183.
13. Exh. "M", Records, p. 182.
14. Medico-Legal Necropsy Report, Exh. "K"; Records, p. 19.

15. People v. Villonez, G.R. Nos. 122976-77,16 November 1998, 298 SCRA 566.
16. Appellants' Brief, p. 14; Rollo, p. 50.
17. People v. Gargar, G.R. No. 110029, 19 December 1998, 300 SCRA 542.
18. People v. Cañales, G.R. No. 126319, 12 October 1998, 297 SCRA 667, 675.
19. TSN, 22 March 2000, pp. 3–4.

20. Id., 5 April 2000, p. 48.

21. Id., p. 36.
22. Id., p. 13; Rollo, p. 49.
23. Appellee's Brief, pp. 23–24; Rollo, pp. 111–112.
24. See People v. Palomar, G.R. Nos. 108183-85, 21 August 1997, 278 SCRA 114.

25. Reyes, The Revised Penal Code, Book 1 (1993), at 653.

26. People v. Lawas, 97 Phil. 975 (unreported).
27. TSN, 22 March 2000, pp. 15–16.
28. People v. Abella, No. L-32205, 31 August 1979, 93 SCRA 25.

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