People vs. Robiños

Where the law prescribes a penalty consisting of two indivisible penalties and neither aggravating nor mitigating circumstances are present, the lesser penalty shall be imposed; thus, for parricide with unintentional abortion under the law as amended by RA 7659, the proper penalty is reclusion perpetua, not death. Insanity as an exempting circumstance requires proof that the accused was completely deprived of reason or discernment at the precise moment of the crime's commission, and evidence of mental derangement subsequent to the offense is insufficient to overturn the presumption of sanity.

Melecio Robiños and Lorenza Robiños were spouses residing at Barangay San Isidro, Camiling, Tarlac, with their children including fifteen-year-old Lorenzo and nineteen-year-old Federico. The marriage was marked by occasional quarrels. At the time of the killing, Lorenza was six months pregnant. The crime of parricide, as amended by Republic Act No. 7659, carries the penalty of reclusion perpetua to death — two indivisible penalties whose application depends on the presence or absence of aggravating and mitigating circumstances. Article 48 of the Revised Penal Code governs complex crimes, mandating that the penalty for the most serious offense be imposed when a single act constitutes two or more grave or less grave felonies.

On March 25, 1995, at around seven o'clock in the morning, fifteen-year-old Lorenzo Robiños was in his parents' house at Barangay San Isidro, Camiling, Tarlac, cooking while his parents — appellant Melecio Robiños and victim Lorenza Robiños — were quarrelling in the sala. Lorenzo heard his mother tell appellant, "Why did you come home, why don't you just leave?" From a distance of about five meters, Lorenzo then saw appellant stab Lorenza on the right shoulder with a double-bladed knife. Blood gushed from the wound and she fell to the floor. Upon witnessing the attack, Lorenzo immediately fled to his grandmother's house to report the incident.

At around eight o'clock that same morning, Benjamin Bueno, the victim's brother, was at the house of his mother Remedios Bueno at Barangay San Isidro. Benjamin, a resident of Barangay Mabilang in Paniqui, Tarlac, had gone to inform his relatives that on the evening of March 24, 1995, appellant had killed his uncle Alejandro Robiños at Barangay Mabilang. While at his mother's house, he received the news that his sister Lorenza had been killed by appellant. From approximately 150 meters away, Benjamin saw appellant, who shouted at him, "It's good you would see how your sister died." Benjamin sought the help of Barangay Captain Virgilio Valdez, who called the Camiling police station. SPO1 Herbert Lugo and SPO3 Tirso Martin, together with other members of the PNP Alert Team, proceeded to the scene, where they saw blood dripping from the house. When appellant failed to come out, the police and barangay officials detached the bamboo wall, exposing the section where SPO1 Lugo saw appellant embracing his wife. Appellant was lying on his side, holding a bloodstained double-bladed knife in his right hand, and uttering, "I will kill myself, I will kill myself." Lorenza, lying on her back, was no longer breathing. Before being pulled away from the body, appellant admitted to Barangay Kagawad Rolando Valdez that he had killed his wife, showing him the bloodstained knife. The police restrained appellant and brought him to the station, but he had to be taken to the Camiling District Hospital for treatment of a self-inflicted stab wound. A Special Report prepared by Senior Inspector Reynaldo B. Orante disclosed that Lorenza was six months pregnant and suffered forty-one stab wounds on different parts of her body, and that appellant was under the influence of liquor at the time.

Appellant did not refute that he killed his wife but interposed the defense of insanity. His son Federico Robiños testified that before March 23, 1995, appellant told him he had seen a person enter their house who wanted to kill him, and that on March 23, 1995, appellant repeated this to his mother, causing a quarrel. The other defense witnesses — nurse Lourdes Fajardo and detention prisoners Benedict Rebollos and Domingo Francisco of the Tarlac Penal Colony — testified on appellant's bizarre behavior while in detention: isolation, staring into space, murmuring alone, laughing and crying without companion, and refusing to respond during prisoner counts. Appellant himself testified that on March 25, 1995, nothing unusual happened, that he did not know he was charged with parricide with unintentional abortion, and that he could not believe he had killed his wife. A psychiatrist, Dr. Maria Mercedita Mendoza, examined appellant on September 11, 1995 — six months after the crime — and testified that he was suffering from schizophrenia, paranoid type, and that it was possible the condition had existed at the time of the killing, though she admitted her conclusion was not definite and was merely an opinion. She was unable to conduct a background study on the history of his mental condition prior to the killing because a social worker failed to gather the necessary data. The trial court found these declarations conjectural and inconclusive, noting that the seven-month gap between the crime and the examination afforded appellant an opportunity to feign mental derangement.

• Weight of Psychiatric Evaluation: Appellant argued that the trial court erred in not giving probative weight to the testimony and psychiatric evaluation of Dr. Maria Mercedita Mendoza, who found him to be suffering from psychosis or insanity classified under schizophrenia, paranoid type.
• Defense of Insanity: Appellant maintained that the trial court erred in disregarding his defense of insanity, which he interposed to absolve himself of criminal liability for the killing of his wife.

• Concession on Penalty: The Office of the Solicitor General conceded that the trial court erred in imposing the death penalty, acknowledging that the capital penalty was imposed without consideration of aggravating and mitigating circumstances and was contrary to the rules on application of penalties under the Revised Penal Code.
• Sufficiency of Conviction: The prosecution's evidence established beyond reasonable doubt the identity of the culprit and the commission of the complex crime of parricide with unintentional abortion, as appellant himself did not present evidence to contravene the allegation that he killed his wife.

• Insanity as Exempting Circumstance: Whether the defense of insanity should be appreciated to exempt appellant from criminal liability for the killing of his wife.
• Proper Penalty: Whether the trial court correctly imposed the death penalty for the complex crime of parricide with unintentional abortion.

• Insanity as Exempting Circumstance: No. The defense of insanity was rejected because the evidence of mental derangement pertained to the period after the crime, not to the moment of its commission, and the psychiatric evaluation was conjectural and inconclusive.
• Proper Penalty: No. The death penalty was improperly imposed; because neither aggravating nor mitigating circumstances were established, Article 63 of the Revised Penal Code mandates the lesser of two indivisible penalties, making reclusion perpetua the correct penalty.

• Insanity as Exempting Circumstance: Insanity as an exempting circumstance presupposes that the accused was completely deprived of reason or discernment and freedom of will at the time of the commission of the crime. The presumption of law always lies in favor of sanity, and the burden of proving insanity rests on the defendant. Here, the evidence showed that a domestic altercation preceded the fatal stabbing — appellant's wife hurled insulting remarks at him, and his act of stabbing her was a deliberate and conscious reaction, as attested to by their son Lorenzo. Appellant was also aware of what he had done: he bragged to the victim's brother about killing her, admitted to barangay kagawad Rolando Valdez and police officers that he had killed his wife while showing the weapon used, and exhibited behavior consistent with repentance and remorse. The bulk of the defense evidence — testimonies of the nurse and fellow detention prisoners at the Tarlac Penal Colony — pertained to appellant's mental condition after the crime and during detention, not at the time of the killing. Only Federico Robiños testified on appellant's behavior before the crime, and that testimony did not establish complete deprivation of intelligence. Dr. Mendoza's psychiatric evaluation, conducted six months after the crime, was conjectural and inconclusive; she had no opportunity to observe appellant's behavior before, during, or immediately after the offense, could not conduct a background study of his mental condition prior to the incident, and admitted her conclusion was merely an opinion. Because insanity must be proven to have existed at the time of the offense or prior thereto, and evidence of insanity subsequent to the crime cannot support acquittal, the defense failed to overcome the presumption of sanity.

• Proper Penalty: Under Article 48 of the Revised Penal Code, when a single act constitutes two or more grave or less grave felonies, the penalty for the most serious crime shall be imposed. The graver offense here is parricide, which under RA 7659 is punishable by reclusion perpetua to death — two indivisible penalties. Article 63 of the Revised Penal Code provides that when the law prescribes a penalty composed of two indivisible penalties and there are neither mitigating nor aggravating circumstances, the lesser penalty shall be applied. The trial court imposed the maximum penalty without considering the presence or absence of aggravating and mitigating circumstances, contrary to the rules on application of penalties. Because neither aggravating nor mitigating circumstances were established, the imposable penalty is reclusion perpetua. Parricide is not a capital crime per se; the law provides a flexible penalty whose application depends on the circumstances attending the offense.

• Presumption of Sanity — Every person is presumed to be of sound mind, and one who pleads the exempting circumstance of insanity bears the burden of proving it. Failing such proof, the accused is presumed sane when the crime was committed. The Court applied this doctrine by holding that the defense evidence was insufficient to overthrow the presumption, as it failed to establish complete deprivation of reason at the time of the killing.

• Insanity as an Exempting Circumstance — Insanity presupposes that the accused was completely deprived of reason or discernment and freedom of will at the time of the commission of the crime. Only when there is complete deprivation of intelligence at the time of the commission should the exempting circumstance be considered. The evidence must refer to the time preceding the act under prosecution or to the very moment of its execution; evidence of insanity subsequent to the commission of the crime cannot warrant acquittal. The Court applied this doctrine by requiring that appellant's mental condition be assessed at the precise moment of the killing, and by rejecting evidence of derangement manifested only during detention.

• Application of Two Indivisible Penalties (Article 63, Revised Penal Code) — When the law prescribes a penalty composed of two indivisible penalties, the following rules apply: (1) when there is one aggravating circumstance without any mitigating, the greater penalty shall be imposed; (2) when there are neither mitigating nor aggravating circumstances, the lesser penalty shall be applied. The Court applied this doctrine by reducing the penalty from death to reclusion perpetua, since neither aggravating nor mitigating circumstances were established.

• Complex Crimes (Article 48, Revised Penal Code) — When a single act constitutes two or more grave or less grave felonies, the penalty for the most serious crime shall be imposed. The Court applied this doctrine by identifying parricide as the graver offense in the complex crime of parricide with unintentional abortion and imposing the penalty corresponding to parricide.

• "Insanity presupposes that the accused was completely deprived of reason or discernment and freedom of will at the time of the commission of the crime." — This passage states the canonical formulation of the insanity defense in Philippine criminal law, defining the quantum of deprivation required for the exempting circumstance to apply.

• "When there are neither mitigating nor aggravating circumstances in the commission of the deed, the lesser penalty shall be applied." — This quotation reproduces the controlling provision of Article 63 of the Revised Penal Code as applied by the Court, establishing the rule for imposing the lesser of two indivisible penalties in the absence of modifying circumstances.

• "an inquiry into the mental state of accused-appellant should relate to the period immediately before or at the precise moment of doing the act which is the subject of the inquiry, and his mental condition after that crucial period or during the trial is inconsequential for purposes of determining his criminal liability." — Quoted from People vs. Villa, this passage articulates the temporal requirement for the insanity defense: evidence must pertain to the moment of the act or immediately before it, not to any period thereafter.

• People vs. Danao, 215 SCRA 795 (1992) — Cited for the proposition that insanity is a defense in the nature of a confession or avoidance requiring clear and convincing proof, and that the presumption of sanity lies in favor of the prosecution absent proof to the contrary.
• People vs. Diaz, 320 SCRA 168 (1999) — Cited for the rule that a defendant relying on mental incapacity bears the burden of establishing insanity at the very moment the crime was committed.
• People vs. Villa, 331 SCRA 142 (2000) — Cited and extensively quoted for the principle that inquiry into the accused's mental state must relate to the period immediately before or at the precise moment of the act, and that mental condition after the crime or during trial is inconsequential for determining criminal liability.
• People vs. Medina, 286 SCRA 44 (1998) — Cited for the presumption that every person is of sound mind in the absence of proof to the contrary.
• People vs. Pedroso, 336 SCRA 163 (2000) — Cited for the rule that when the law prescribes two indivisible penalties, the court must impose one or the other depending on the presence or absence of mitigating and aggravating circumstances.
• People vs. Cayago, 312 SCRA 623 (1999) — Cited for the rule that when neither mitigating nor aggravating circumstances are present and the penalty consists of two indivisible penalties, the lesser penalty shall be imposed.
• People vs. Reyes, 292 SCRA 663 (1998) — Cited for the principle that parricide is not a capital crime per se and that the law provides a flexible penalty of reclusion perpetua to death.

• Article 48, Revised Penal Code — Governs complex crimes; provides that when a single act constitutes two or more grave or less grave felonies, the penalty for the most serious crime shall be imposed. Applied to determine that the penalty for parricide, the graver offense, governs the complex crime of parricide with unintentional abortion.
• Article 63, Revised Penal Code — Prescribes the rules for applying penalties composed of two indivisible penalties; provides that when there are neither mitigating nor aggravating circumstances, the lesser penalty shall be applied. Applied to reduce the penalty from death to reclusion perpetua.
• Republic Act No. 7659 — Amended the law on parricide to prescribe the penalty of reclusion perpetua to death. Applied as the statutory basis for the two indivisible penalties available for parricide.

Davide, Jr., C.J., Bellosillo, Melo, Puno, Vitug, Kapunan, Mendoza, Quisumbing, Ynares-Santiago, De Leon, Jr., Sandoval-Gutierrez, Carpio, Austria-Martinez, and Corona, JJ., concurred.