People vs Opiada (Presumption of Innocence)

FACTS: On July 31, 1976, in Quezon City, several persons ganged up on Fabian Galvan, stoned and hit him with beer bottles until finally one of them stabbed him to death. The actual knife-wielder was identified as Mario del Mundo. Nonetheless, Alberto Opida and Virgilio Marcelo were charged with murder as conspirators and, after trial, sentenced to death.

The basis of their conviction by the trial court was the testimony of two prosecution witnesses, neither of whom positively said that the accused were at the scene of the crime, their extrajudicial confessions, which were secured without the assistance of counsel, and corroboration of the alleged conspiracy under the theory of interlocking confession.

What is striking about this case is the way the trial judge conducted his interrogation of the two accused and their lone witness, Lilian Layug. It was hardly judicious and certainly far from judicial, at times irrelevant, at Worst malicious. Reading the transcript, one gathers the impression that the judge had allied himself with the prosecution to discredit the credibility of the witnesses for the defense in the outset.

Besides belaboring Opida's criminal activities and his tattoos, the judge asked him if he had "ever been convicted at the National Mental Hospital and suggested to him that his claim of manhandling by the police was a lie because investigators leave no mark when they torture a suspect. This was a point that could have been validly raised by the prosecution but certainly not by the court. The judge also made it of record that the witness was gnashing his teeth, was showing signs of hostility, that he was uneasy and that he was restless. "Now, whom do you want to fool the judge asked, "the prosecutor, your lawyer, or the court?

In the hearing Virgilio Marcelo, the other accused, interrogation was conducted almost wholly by the judge who started cross-examining the witness even before the defense counsel could ask his first question, and took over from the prosecution the task of impeaching Marcelo's credibility. Defense counsel could hardly put in a word edgewise because the judge kept interrupting to ask his own questions.

But the judge was to save the best or worst of his spite for the third witness, Lilian Layug, a waitress in the restaurant where the appellant Opida was working as a cook. Noting at the outset that she spoke English, he wanted to know where she had learned it and asked in ill-concealed insinuation if she had worked in Angeles City or Olongapo or Sangley.

ISSUE: WON the accused should be acquitted due to violation of their constitutional rights

HELD: The scales of justice must hang equal and, in fact, should even be tipped in favor of the accused because of the constitutional presumption of innocence. Needless to stress, this right is available to every accused, whatever his present circumstance and no matter how dark and repellent his past. Despite their sinister connotations in our society, tattoos are at best dubious adornments only and surely not under our laws indicia of criminality. Of bad taste perhaps, but not of crime.

While this is not to say that the accused are not guilty, it does mean that, because their constitutional rights have been violated, their guilt, if it exists, has not been established beyond reasonable doubt and so cannot be pronounced. Due process has stayed the uneven hand of the quick condemnor and must set the defendants free.

WHEREFORE, the conviction of Alberto Opida and Virgilio Marcelo is reversed and they were ordered released immediately.