G.R. No. 239032 - People vs. Floresta y Selencio

Case Summary (G.R. No. 239032)

Petitioner and Respondent

Petitioner (appellant before the Supreme Court): Gilbert Floresta y Selencio, convicted by lower courts of Murder. Respondent: People of the Philippines, prosecuting the crime as charged under the Revised Penal Code.

Key Dates

Incident: evening of December 28, 2012. Information filed: December 29, 2012. RTC decision convicting the accused: November 23, 2015. Court of Appeals decision affirming with modifications: April 21, 2017. Supreme Court decision (appeal): June 17, 2019.

Applicable Law

The decision was rendered under the framework applicable after the 1987 Philippine Constitution. Substantive and evidentiary rules applied include Article 248 of the Revised Penal Code (Murder) and the Revised Rules on Evidence, including the hearsay exception for res gestae declarations and the principles governing circumstantial evidence.

Charge and Accusatory Allegations

The Information charged that on or about December 28, 2012 at Sitio Calumpang, Brgy. Malinta, Masbate City, the accused, with intent to kill and attended by treachery and evident premeditation, attacked and shot Jay Lourd with a firearm (unknown caliber), hitting his left upper chest and inflicting mortal wounds that directly caused his death, thereby violating Article 248 of the Revised Penal Code.

Facts as Found by the Prosecution

The prosecution’s narrative is that the victim was drinking in the kitchen with Allan and another companion when, after two shots of gin, Jay Lourd stood up, said to Allan “Pare, I was hit, may tama ako,” and shortly thereafter a cracking sound was heard. Allan ran away; Jennifer heard the gunshot while breastfeeding, found her husband bloodied, applied a cloth to the wound, and recounted that Jay Lourd asked her, “Panggay, you see if Gilbert is still there?” Jay Lourd was taken to the hospital and pronounced dead. Jennifer later informed the police that Gilbert shot her husband, leading to his apprehension. The accused asserted an alibi that he had spent the afternoon at a cockfight and later played cara y cruz with named companions until about 9:00 p.m.; Rico and Rely corroborated this alibi at trial.

RTC Disposition

The Regional Trial Court (Branch 44, Masbate City) found Gilbert guilty beyond reasonable doubt of Murder in its November 23, 2015 Decision. The RTC treated the victim’s post-shooting utterance as part of the res gestae, affording it full evidentiary weight as direct evidence. The RTC also found the killing attended by treachery and discredited the accused’s alibi for failing to show physical impossibility of presence at the scene. The accused was sentenced to reclusion perpetua and ordered to pay P50,000.00 each as civil indemnity and moral damages.

Court of Appeals Ruling

The Court of Appeals affirmed the conviction with modifications in its April 21, 2017 decision. It increased civil indemnity and moral damages to P75,000.00 each, awarded exemplary damages of P75,000.00 and temperate damages of P50,000.00, and imposed interest at six percent per annum on the monetary awards from finality until fully paid. The CA held that the victim’s res gestae declaration positively identified Gilbert as his assailant and that the elements of Murder were proven.

Issue Presented to the Supreme Court

Whether the conviction of Gilbert for Murder should be upheld, specifically whether the prosecution established beyond reasonable doubt that Gilbert was the person who shot and killed Jay Lourd.

Scope of Review and Legal Standard

The Supreme Court noted that a criminal appeal opens the entire case for review and that the appellate court has full jurisdiction to reexamine the records, revise the judgment, increase the penalty, and apply the proper penal provisions. The Court reiterated the elements required to prove Murder: (a) that a person was killed; (b) that the accused killed the person; (c) that the killing was attended by any qualifying circumstances under Article 248 RPC; and (d) that the killing is not parricide or infanticide. The Court emphasized that the identity of the offender must be proven beyond reasonable doubt.

Admissibility and Weight of the Res Gestae Declaration

The Supreme Court agreed with the lower courts that the victim’s utterance, “Panggay, you see if Gilbert is still there?” was admissible as part of the res gestae under the Revised Rules on Evidence because: (a) the shooting was a startling occurrence; (b) the declaration was made spontaneously shortly after the shooting without time to concoct; and (c) the statement concerned the shooting and its immediate circumstances. However, the Court stressed the distinction between admissibility and probative weight: admissibility determines whether evidence may be considered at all; probative value is the extent to which it proves a fact. The Court found that the utterance, though admissible, did not constitute a positive, categorical identification of the shooter.

Application of the Equipoise Rule to the Victim’s Utterance

Because the victim’s statement was susceptible to multiple reasonable interpretations—none of which amounted to a clear and categorical identification—the Supreme Court applied the equipoise rule. Where inculpatory facts admit of two or more explanations, one consistent with innocence and another with guilt, the evidence fails to meet the test of moral certainty required for conviction. Consequently, the victim’s ambiguous remark could not be treated as direct evidence conclusively implicating Gilbert.

Assessment of Circumstantial Evidence

The Court considered whether circumstantial evidence, in the absence of direct identification, could sustain a conviction. It reiterated the criteria for conviction by circumstantial evidence: (a) more than one circumstance must be present; (b) the facts from which inferences are drawn must be proven; and (c) the combined circumstances must produce moral certainty of guilt. Circumstantial evidence must form an unbroken chain pointing to the accused to the exclusion of o

Case Syllabus (G.R. No. 239032)

Procedural History

Ordinary appeal filed by accused-appellant Gilbert Floresta y Selencio (Gilbert) assailing the Decision dated April 21, 2017 of the Court of Appeals (CA) in CA-G.R. CR H.C. No. 08103, which affirmed with modifications the RTC Decision dated November 23, 2015 in Criminal Case No. 15733, finding Gilbert guilty beyond reasonable doubt of Murder under Article 248 of the Revised Penal Code (RPC).
Notice of Appeal referenced in records: Notice of Appeal dated December 1, 2017 (rollo, pp. 16-18) and another Notice of Appeal dated December 9, 2015 (id. at 26-29) for earlier appeals in the case chronology.
RTC Decision (November 23, 2015) by Judge Designate Arturo Clemente B. Revil found Gilbert guilty and sentenced him to reclusion perpetua and ordered payment of P50,000.00 as civil indemnity and P50,000.00 as moral damages to the heirs of the victim.
CA Decision (April 21, 2017) penned by Associate Justice Florito S. Macalino, with Associate Justices Mariflor P. Punzalan Castillo and Maria Elisa Sempio Diy concurring, affirmed conviction with modifications: increased civil indemnity and moral damages to P75,000.00 each; awarded exemplary damages of P75,000.00 and temperate damages of P50,000.00; imposed interest of six percent (6%) per annum on all monetary awards from the date of finality of its decision until fully paid (rollo, pp. 2-15; id. at 14-15).
Appeal to the Supreme Court resulted in a Decision by Justice Perlas-Bernabe, with Carpio (Chairperson), Caguioa, J. Reyes, Jr., and Lazaro-Javier, JJ., concurring, granting the appeal, reversing and setting aside the CA decision, and acquitting Gilbert of Murder; the Director of the Bureau of Corrections was ordered to cause his immediate release unless lawfully held for another reason.

Facts Established by the Prosecution (as alleged in the Information and trial)

Information dated December 29, 2012 charged that on or about December 28, 2012 in the evening at Sitio Calumpang, Brgy. Malinta, Masbate City, Gilbert, "with intent to kill, treachery and evident premeditation," attacked, assaulted and shot one Jay Lourd Bones y Zurbito with a firearm of unknown caliber, hitting him on the left upper chest and inflicting mortal wounds which caused his death (records, pp. 1-2).
Prosecution’s narrative: at about 8:00 p.m. on December 28, 2012, victim Jay Lourd was drinking with Allan Andaya and Benjie in the kitchen of his house; after two shots of gin, Jay Lourd stood and said to Allan, "Pare, I was hit, may tama ako."; Allan heard a cracking sound behind him and ran away; Jay Lourd’s wife Jennifer, breastfeeding the youngest child, heard the gunshot, went to the kitchen, found Jay Lourd bloodied on the floor, and covered his wound with a cloth; Jay Lourd asked Jennifer, "Panggay, you see if Gilbert is still there?"; Jennifer later learned at the hospital that Jay Lourd was already dead and reported to police that Gilbert shot Jay Lourd; Gilbert was apprehended by police thereafter (rollo, pp. 4-6).
The prosecution relied principally on Jay Lourd’s contemporaneous utterance to Jennifer as a res gestae declaration identifying Gilbert.

Defense and Testimony Supporting Alibi

Gilbert interposed the defense of alibi: he claimed that from 12:30 until 3:00 p.m. on December 28, 2012, he was watching a cockfight in Purok Casili, Barangay Igang, Masbate City; thereafter he played cara y cruz with Rico Adovas, Rely Dinglasan, Soy Tugbo, and Linkoy Lorenzo until 9:00 p.m.; he then proceeded to Barangay Malinta and observed a crowd near Jay Lourd’s house, learned Jay Lourd had been shot, went home and had dinner, and was later investigated and detained by police when they arrived at his house (rollo, pp. 4-6).
Gilbert’s alibi was corroborated at trial by testimony from Rico and Rely (rollo, p. 6).
The defense was that Gilbert was not present at the time of the shooting and had alibi witnesses corroborating his whereabouts.

RTC Decision and Findings

RTC found Gilbert guilty beyond reasonable doubt of Murder and sentenced him to reclusion perpetua; awarded P50,000.00 civil indemnity and P50,000.00 moral damages to the heirs of Jay Lourd (CA rollo, pp. 15-25; id. at 24).
RTC treated Jay Lourd’s statement "Panggay, you see if Gilbert is still there?" as part of the res gestae and accorded it full evidentiary weight as direct evidence of Gilbert’s culpability, rejecting the defense that the victim’s declaration was a mere afterthought.
RTC found treachery present, reasoning that (a) at the time of the incident Jay Lourd was drinking with friends and had no inkling that anyone would shoot him, and (b) the shooting occurred such that he could not properly defend himself (id. at 20-21).
RTC discredited the alibi defense on the ground that Gilbert failed to show it was physically impossible for him to be at the scene of the crime (id. at 19-20).

CA Decision and Modifications

CA affirmed Gilbert’s conviction but modified monetary a