VALEROSO VS.

PEOPLE OF THE PHILIPPINES

G.R. No. 164815, February 22, 2008

FACTS

Petitioner, Jerry C. Valeroso, was charged with illegal possession of firearm and ammunition under P.D. 1866 and was
found liable as charged before the RTC of Quezon City. On July 10, 1996, the Central District Command served a duly issued
warrant of arrest to Sr.Insp. Jerry Valeroso in a case of kidnapping for ransom. Valeroso was found and arrested in INP Central
Station in Culiat, Quezon City where he was about to board a tricycle. He was bodily searched and after which a firearm with live
ammunition was found tucked in his waist. The subject firearm was later verified by the Firearms and Explosive Division at Camp
Crame and was confirmed and revealed to have not been issued to the petitioner but to another person.

The defense on the other hand contended that Valeroso was arrested and searched in the boarding house of his
children in New Era Quezon City. He was aroused from his slumber when four heavily armed men in civilian clothes bolted the
room. The pointed their guns on him and pulled him out of the room as the raiding team went back inside, searched and ransacked
the room. Moments later an operative came out of the room exclaiming that he has found a gun inside. Adrian Yuson, an occupant
to the adjacent room testified for the defense. SPO3 Timbol, Jr. testified that the firearm with live ammunition was issued to Jerry
Valeroso by virtue of a Memorandum Receipt.

Firearms and Explosive Division at Camp Crame revealed that the petitioner has a lack of authority to possess the
firearm, Deriquito testified that a verification of the Charter Arms Caliber .38 bearing serial No. 52315 was not issued to petitioner.
It was registered in the name of a certain Raul Palencia Salvatierra of Sampaloc, Manila. As a proof, Deriquito presented a
certification signed by Roque, the chief records officer of Firearms and Explosive Division at Camp Crame.

P.D. No 1866 was the existing law at the time of the crime until it was repealed by R.A. No 8294, where the penalty is
reclusion perpetua.

RTA and CA convicted him, under R.A. No. 8294 with the penalty of prison correccional in its maximum period and a
fine of not less than Fifteen Thousand Pesos (P15,000).

ISSUE

Does the penalty under R.A. No 8294 should be the one imposed upon the petitioner

HELD

YES. As stated in Article 4 of the Civil Code, Law shall have no retroactive effect, unless the contrary is provided. A new
law has a prospective, not retroactive, effect because the law looks forward, never backward. However, penal laws that favor a
guilty person, who is not a habitual deliquent, shall be given retroactive effect. In the present case, although an additional fee of
P15,000 is imposed by R.A. No. 8294, the same is still advantageous to the accused, considering that the imprisonment is lowered
to prison correccional in its maximum period from reclusion perpetua under P.D. No. 1866. Therefore, penalty imposed under
R.A. No. 8294 should be imposed upon the petitioner.

ALMENDARES