Title
People vs. Esparas
Case
G.R. No. 120034
Decision Date
Jul 10, 1998
Josefina Esparas and Rodrigo Libed convicted for importing 20kg of shabu; Esparas' state witness request denied, death penalty upheld due to organized crime involvement.
death penalty
smuggling shabu
state witness
A

Case Summary (G.R. No. 120034)

Factual Background: Interception at NAIA

On May 20, 1994, at 12:45 p.m., Cathay Pacific Airways (flight no. CX-901) arrived at NAIA from Hongkong. At 1:30 p.m., passengers including Esparas and her niece, Alma Juson, lined up at customs inspection lane no. 3, where Customs Examiner Perla C. Bandong was assigned.

Libed approached Examiner Bandong and presented the baggage declaration form of Esparas and Juson (No. CX-4200140). He also used an official business pass and a Citizens Crime Watch pin. Libed placed Esparas’s black traveling bag (tag no. CX 849430) on the inspection table. Upon unzipping, Examiner Bandong saw used clothes on top and discovered a wooden base halfway through, prompting suspicion of a false bottom. When Bandong asked what was underneath the plywood, Libed claimed it contained personal effects. Bandong remained unconvinced. Libed then suggested that the matter involved the Collectors Office, urging compliance rather than examination.

Examiner Bandong called Collector Celso Templo. Templo ordered a more thorough inspection and instructed Bandong to slash the false bottom. The bag yielded a black plastic bag containing yellowish crystalline granules. The seized substance weighed 9.97276 kilograms and tested positive for Methamphetamine Hydrochloride. After this discovery, Libed identified himself by presenting his Citizens Crime Watch identification. He maintained that the contents had been cleared by higher authorities.

While Libed was being questioned, Juson—followed closely by Esparas—pushed a cart loaded with another black traveling bag toward the exit gate. Collector Templo noticed the movement and ordered Customs Police Agent Mariano Biteng to intercept them. Biteng arrested and escorted Juson and Esparas back to lane no. 3. The second traveling bag (tag no. CX 849429) also had a false bottom. After it was slashed open, Examiner Bandong found another black plastic bag containing 9.97479 kilograms of shabu, confirmed by customs chemist Elizabeth Ayonon.

Customs personnel prepared a Baggage Inventory Report and a Receipt of Property Seized covering the seized regulated drug and other items taken from Esparas and Juson, including Esparas’s plane ticket, relevant luggage claim tags, passport, and arrival immigration card. The total weight of regulated drug seized was 19.94755 kilograms. It was turned over to the PNP NARCOM and deposited in the Bureau of Customs cashiers vault. The traveling bags and used clothing were secured for safekeeping.

Procedural History and Defense Theory

After the incident, the Department of Justice (DOJ) conducted a preliminary investigation. Esparas submitted a counter-affidavit dated June 6, 1994, claiming that the traveling bags belonged to Robert Yu, a Chinese national allegedly introduced by Libed. She alleged that Yu financed her Hongkong trips and requested that she bring the bags on her return. Esparas also filed a manifestation asking to be made a state witness against Yu, whom she described as the real culprit.

After the preliminary investigation, the DOJ charged Esparas and Libed with violation of the Dangerous Drugs Act under Republic Act 6425. Juson was excluded for lack of complicity. During trial, Esparas pleaded not guilty but later absconded after the prosecution presented key witnesses. The defense presented no witnesses at trial and instead offered the records of the preliminary investigation, including Esparas’s counter-affidavit and manifestation.

The trial court found Esparas guilty and imposed the death penalty, a P10 Million fine, and costs. It found that she belonged to an organized/syndicated crime group and that she conspired with Libed to smuggle almost twenty thousand grams of shabu into the country. The Court reviewed the case automatically.

Appellate Developments: Effect of Escape on Automatic Review

In its Resolution dated November 14, 1995, the Court required the Solicitor General and defense counsel to comment on whether Esparas’s escape affected the Court’s jurisdiction to review her conviction. On August 20, 1996, by majority vote, the Court issued an extended resolution upholding its power and duty to review all death penalty cases regardless of the convict’s escape prior to the trial court’s judgment. The Court reasoned that life was at stake and the Constitution vested the Court with a sacred obligation to ensure that no error authorizing the State to take life would pass without review. Esparas was later rearrested, rendering moot the jurisdictional question that had earlier arisen.

Issues on Appeal and Esparas’s Contentions

Esparas, through counsel, assigned two principal errors: first, the trial court’s alleged failure to appreciate her request to act as a state witness to identify the alleged real culprit, Robert Yu; and second, the imposition of the mandatory death penalty and the P10 Million fine and costs.

State Witness Request: Executive Discretion and Rule 119 Requirements

The Court rejected the contention that Esparas should have been used as a state witness against Robert Yu. It held that determining who should be charged is an executive function, not a judicial one. The prosecutor, as the officer authorized to direct and control criminal actions, decides whether there is sufficient ground to charge the accused.

The Court further explained that discharge as a state witness is governed by Section 9, Rule 119 of the 1985 Rules of Criminal Procedure. That provision required, among others, that the accused sought to be discharged must be jointly charged with at least one other accused, and that the testimony must be absolutely necessary with no other direct evidence available, substantially corroborated in material points, and such that the accused is not the most guilty, among other requisites.

The Court agreed with the Solicitor General that Robert Yu was neither a co-accused nor a co-conspirator in the case; his name was merely mentioned by Esparas to shift blame. Therefore, Esparas could not be discharged as a state witness against a person not impleaded and not shown to have participated in the offense. The Court similarly rejected discharge against Libed because the requisites under Section 9, Rule 119 were not met. It found that Esparas’s anticipated testimony would only shift blame, that direct evidence already existed through customs personnel and the seized substances and luggage, and that her testimony could not be substantially corroborated in its material points. It also held that Esparas appeared to be the most guilty given the manner by which she checked in the luggage and attempted to move it out of customs after shabu was discovered.

The Court emphasized that a motion for discharge was never filed by the prosecution at the trial level; hence, the trial court could not be faulted for not granting a “non-existent motion.”

Criminal Liability: Possession, Ownership Presumption, and Proof of Knowledge

On the merits, the Court held that the prosecution evidence established Esparas’s guilt beyond reasonable doubt. It found that the traveling bags containing shabu were in Esparas’s possession, that she accomplished the baggage declaration for her luggage including the subject bags, and that the baggage claim tags attached to her plane ticket linked her to the bags. From these circumstances, the Court applied the disputable presumption under Section 3(j), Rule 131 of the Rules of Court, that things possessed or over which a person exercises acts of ownership are owned by that person. Esparas failed to rebut the presumption.

The Court also considered that Esparas absconded during trial and that the records contained no explanation of how the shabu came into her possession. It ruled there was no evidence negating animus possidendi, or intent to possess. It reiterated that mere uncorroborated claims of lack of knowledge of the prohibited drug were insufficient. It also noted that evasion, false statements, or concealment attempts in explaining how the drug came into one’s possession could be considered in determining guilt. It treated animus possidendi as largely inferable from attendant circumstances.

The Court inferred knowledge from Esparas’s conduct. It found evidence that Libed obtained access using an official business pass based on false representations. It found used clothes inside the bags upon examination, and the discovery of shabu hidden in the false bottom. After the shabu was found, customs personnel were arguing with Libed when Esparas walked away from the inspection lane without waiting for the rest of her luggage to be cleared. She and Juson then attempted to leave clandestinely toward the exit gate. She was intercepted by Agent Biteng. The Court held these actions led to the inescapable conclusion that Esparas knew of the illegal contents of the traveling bags.

The Court gave scant consideration to Esparas’s defense that Robert Yu was the real owner of the shabu. It treated the defense as contained in her counter-affidavit, which it ruled could not be admitted because it was hearsay and lacked probative value absent the affiant’s appearance for cross-examination.

Penalty: Organized/Syndicated Crime Group and the Death Sentence

The Court then addressed the argument that the death penalty should not have been imposed because the prosecution allegedly failed to prove that Esparas belonged to an organized or syndicated crime group and failed to establish conspiracy. The defense relied on a June 20, 1994 resolution recommending dismissal against Libed for lack of conspiracy. The Court was not persuaded.

The Court held that the applicable law at the time of the crime was Republic Act No. 7659, which took effect December 31, 1993, and amended Republic Act No. 6425 and provisions of the Revised Penal Code, including Article 62. Under Section 20 of R.A. No. 7659, unlawfully bringing 200 grams or more of shabu into the country carried the penalty of reclusion perpetua to death, with a fine ran

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