Case Digest (G.R. No. 214865)
Facts:
Rosvee C. Celestial v. People of the Philippines, G.R. No. 214865, August 19, 2015, Supreme Court Third Division, Velasco Jr., J., writing for the Court.Petitioner Rosvee Celestial was employed as Accounting‑in‑Charge by Glory Philippines and was terminated in 2006 after the company discovered anomalous withdrawals from its dollar account. The company president, Akihiro Harada, testified that petitioner prepared withdrawal slips for legitimate expenses, had them signed, then later altered the originally signed slips (keeping duplicates) to withdraw larger amounts; discrepancies between photocopied slips and actual withdrawals revealed the scheme. Six informations for qualified theft through falsification of commercial documents were filed in the Regional Trial Court (RTC), Cavite City, Branch 16, docketed as Criminal Case Nos. 94‑07 to 99‑07.
On June 25, 2013, the RTC convicted petitioner of six counts of qualified theft through falsification of commercial documents and sentenced her to twenty years of reclusion temporal for each count. Petitioner appealed to the Court of Appeals (CA). The CA issued a notice (dated November 20, 2013) directing the filing of appellant’s brief; counsel, Atty. Bernard Paredes, sought two thirty‑day extensions (first to January 26, 2014, then allegedly to February 26, 2014). A CMIS verification showed no brief filed, and the CA, by Resolution dated April 28, 2014, declared the appeal abandoned and dismissed it for failure to file the appellant’s brief under Section 8, Rule 124.
The registry return receipt shows counsel received a copy of the April 28, 2014 Resolution on May 12, 2014. The CA’s July 17, 2014 Resolution entered the April 28 dismissal as final. Petitioner filed an Omnibus Motion on August 22, 2014 seeking reconsideration and leave to file an attached appellant’s brief, asserting lack of personal notice and gross negligence by counsel; the CA denied r...(Subscriber-Only)
Issues:
- Did the Court of Appeals err in dismissing petitioner’s appeal for abandonment/failure to prosecute where petitioner attributed the failure to her counsel’s negligence and claimed she did not personally receive notice?
- If the conviction stands, what is the proper penalty for the six counts of qualified theft through falsificatio...(Subscriber-Only)
Ruling:
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Ratio:
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Doctrine:
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