People vs. Lara

Complete self-defense exempts from criminal liability where unlawful aggression by the deceased, absence of provocation by the accused, and reasonable necessity of the means employed to repel the attack concur, as when the accused fired a pistol while continuously struggling to prevent an ambushing assailant from seizing it in the dark.

Gregorio Lara, about 32 years old and married, and Cayetano Querido were both residents of the municipality of La Paz, Province of Abra. Rufino Roque, an employee of the Bureau of Lands carrying a revolver by reason of his office, was Lara's overnight guest on the night in question. Exemption from criminal liability for self-defense was governed by paragraph 4 of article 8 of the Penal Code.

Gregorio Lara lived in La Paz, Abra, where on the night of September 25, 1924, Rufino Roque, an employee of the Bureau of Lands on official errand, stopped as Lara's guest for the night. Upon retiring, Roque suspended his revolver with its holster from a peg on a beam, a placement noted by Lara. At about 8 o'clock that night, Cayetano Querido, accompanied by four other persons, stationed himself at the crossing immediately in front of Lara's house and entertained his companions with insulting words about Lara's supposed concubine, saying in local slang "Wake up, Ramon, they are eating your chow," "They are burning your clothes," and "Gregorio Lara, they are enticing your concubine, and nevertheless you permit it," greeted with loud guffaws, while Querido formed his palms into a trumpet to change his voice and declared he had long wanted to run up against Lara.

After his patience was exhausted, Lara took down Roque's unloaded revolver, placed two cartridges in the cylinder, and started for the street, whereupon Querido and his companions scattered. Querido went eastward with 16-year-old high-school student Artemio Casel for perhaps a hundred meters, then stopped and hid behind a fence corner in front of the house of Nicolas Velasco, telling Casel "Move away a little as I am going to smash him," while Casel hid behind a fence on the other side to watch. Lara emerged with pistol in hand, found the street empty, discharged the pistol into the air as warning, then walked eastward to ask neighbors the identity of the party, passing the hiding place. Querido then jumped out, threw his arms around Lara to pinion his hands and seize the pistol, and a struggle for possession ensued.

In the course of the struggle, as Lara broke loose and turned to confront Querido, the revolver discharged, the bullet entering Querido's left abdomen, passing through the body, and emerging in the right gluteal region. The wound did not immediately disable Querido, who continued trying to take the pistol and, being a man of strength, threw an arm around Lara's neck and held him as in a vice while calling to Mariano Dolor, whose house was a few paces away, for help. Aroused by the first shot and finding his revolver missing, Roque dressed, followed the second shot to the scene, and moved to recover the pistol, whereupon Querido threw his free arm around Roque's neck and held both men until Dolor arrived, took the pistol at Querido's request after Querido twice said he had been shot by Lara, and all proceeded to the municipal building, Lara helping support the weakening wounded man on the way.

Querido died within about three days from the wound. In the interval he signed two statements: one before the justice of the peace immediately upon reaching the municipal building stating "Perhaps I am going to die very soon, justice" and "We were able to take from the hands of Lara the revolver which a friend had lent him," admitted without objection; and a later statement before E. Parado and Feliciano Fariñas after giving up hope of life, attributing rancor to Lara's suspicion that Querido had induced his concubine to seek another man. Neither statement described additional circumstances of the shooting. A few days later Lara told Lieutenant Garcia that he discharged the revolver as soon as he broke loose from his seizer. The trial court found these facts sufficient for homicide and imposed fourteen years, eight months and one day of reclusion temporal with accessories, P1,000 indemnity, and costs.

• Self-Defense: Whether the killing of Cayetano Querido constituted complete self-defense under subsection 4 of article 8 of the Penal Code warranting acquittal.
• Reasonable Necessity of Means: Whether firing the revolver during the struggle for its possession was reasonably necessary to repel the unlawful aggression, notwithstanding that the accused had momentarily broken loose and that the struggle continued after the shot.

• Self-Defense: Yes. Complete self-defense was made out, there having been unlawful aggression by the deceased, no provocation by the appellant, and assault characterized by alevosia.
• Reasonable Necessity of Means: Yes. Firing was reasonably necessary in light of darkness, surprise, revealed intent to beat the appellant up, and real danger of the assailant seizing the pistol and using it against the appellant.

• Self-Defense: Unlawful aggression was established because while Lara passed along the street at night, Querido sprang upon him from ambush and began a struggle primarily for the revolver with criminal design of beating him up, manifestly with alevosia. No provocation whatever came from Lara, while the provocation given by Querido's insulting nocturnal taunts about the concubine was of a nature to provoke wrath in any spirited person. The deceased's failure in his dying statements to allege any fact unfavorable to the accused regarding the shooting confirmed that the shot occurred while the combatants struggled over the pistol, and the struggle was continuous rather than ended when Lara momentarily broke loose.
• Reasonable Necessity of Means: The necessity was judged upon darkness of night, surprise, and revealed intention to beat Lara up, under which continued struggle on equal terms risked the assailant gaining the revolver and, in the excitement, shooting Lara with impunity. Having been attacked in the dark while known to hold a pistol, Lara could not on peril of his life permit its capture, and firing for defense was the only means of prevention. That the struggle continued after the fatal shot did not negate necessity, since Lara reasonably explained he fought to retain even the then-emptied pistol lest Querido use it as a cudgel, and human nature in such emergencies acts on instinct of self-preservation rather than formal reason.

• Self-defense as justifying circumstance — Complete self-defense under paragraph 4 of article 8 of the Penal Code requires unlawful aggression on the part of the person killed, reasonable necessity of the means employed to prevent or repel it, and lack of sufficient provocation on the part of the person defending himself. The three requisites were applied to acquit where the deceased ambushed the accused at night to seize his pistol and beat him, without provocation by the accused, and the accused fired during the continuous struggle.
• Continuous aggression and reasonable necessity — Danger is not deemed to have ceased for an instant where the aggressor maintains a decidedly aggressive attitude from commencement to termination of the struggle, and the person assaulted need not expose himself to the contingency that through an incident or favorable accident the assailant may recover the weapon. Applied to hold justified the slaying with the assailant's own knife or bolo in prior cases, and by parity to firing to prevent a superior-strength aggressor from obtaining the only weapon the assaulted party could use.
• Instinct of self-preservation in emergencies — In sudden emergencies human nature acts in obedience to the instinct of self-preservation rather than processes of formal reason, and where a person has reasonably acted upon that instinct the courts must sanction the act and hold the actor irresponsible in law. Applied to excuse Lara's use of the pistol when surprised in the dark and grappled for its possession.

• "It should be borne in mind that in emergencies of this kind human nature does not act upon processes of formal reason but in obedience to the instinct of self-preservation; and when it is apparent, as in this case, that a person has reasonably acted upon this instinct, it is the duty of the courts to sanction the act and to hold the actor irresponsible in law for the consequences." — States the rationale for judging reasonable necessity by instinctive self-preservation rather than calm deliberation.
• ". . . If through a fortunate accident he came into possession of the knife, he could have lost control of it through a similar accident and then found himself at the mercy of his assailant. Therefore the act of the defendant rendering his assailant powerless as well as he could under the critical circumstances of the moment, and repelling his aggression, constitute, in our opinion, a true case of self-defense, which exempts the defendant from any criminal liability under paragraph 4 of article 8 of the Penal Code." — Quoted formulation from United States vs. Patala on continued right to disable the aggressor despite temporary possession of the weapon.
• ". . . Considering the decidedly aggressive attitude of the deceased from the commencement of this struggle until its termination, it cannot be said that there was a cessation of the danger for the accused, even for a single instant." — Quoted formulation from United States vs. Molina supporting continuous danger during struggle for a weapon.

• United States vs. Patala, 2 Phil., 752, 757 — Followed as controlling on self-defense where the assaulted party wrested the assailant's knife and inflicted a fatal wound; danger was held not to have passed merely because the accused momentarily gained the weapon.
• United States vs. Molina, 19 Phil., 227 — Followed as controlling where the appellant slew his bolo-wielding assailant with the bolo obtained in the struggle; means were held rationally necessary while struggle and danger subsisted without provocation.
• United States vs. Salazar and Villanueva, 15 Phil., 315 — Cited to extend the same reasoning to the present case where the accused used his own weapon to prevent a stronger aggressor from seizing it.

• Subsection 4 of article 8, Penal Code — Provides exemption from criminal liability for one who acts in defense of his person where unlawful aggression, reasonable necessity of means, and lack of sufficient provocation concur. Applied to absolve Lara upon finding all requisites present.

Avanceña, C.J., Malcolm, Ostrand, Johns, and Villa-Real, JJ., concur. Villamor, J., took no part in this decision.

• Romualdez, J. — Maintained that extraordinary superiority of strength in the deceased was not proven and that after being wounded the deceased merely leaned on Lara and Roque for support rather than holding them aggressively, citing Dolor's testimony and Lara's own statement that he and Roque held the deceased to take him to the municipal building. Concluded that what was proven was incomplete self-defense only.