Political Law; Constitutional Law; Bill of Rights; Rights of Suspects

Any person under investigation for the commission of an offense shall have the right to be informed of
his right to remain silent and to have competent and independent counsel preferably of his own choice. If
the person cannot afford the services of counsel, he must be provided with one. These rights cannot be
waived except in writing and in the presence of counsel.

No torture, force, violence, threat, intimidation, or any other means which vitiate the free will shall be
used against him. Secret detention places, solitary, incommunicado, or other similar forms of detention
are prohibited.

Any confession or admission obtained in violation of this or Section 17 hereof shall be inadmissible in
evidence against him.

The law shall provide for penal and civil sanctions for violations of this Section as well as compensation
to the rehabilitation of victims of torture or similar practices, and their families. [Section 12, Article III,
1987 Constitution]

The rights available to a person under investigation are: (1) Right to remain silent; (2) The Right to a
competent and independent counsel preferably of his own choice; (3) The Right to be informed of such
rights. [Bernas, The 1987 Philippine Constitution: A Comprehensive Reviewer (2011)]

It is but a recognition of the fact that the psychological if not the physical athmosphere of custodial
investigations, in the absence of proper safeguards, is inherently coercive. [Miranda v. Arizona, 384
U.S. 436 (1966)]

Availability

The rights begin to be available where the investigation is no longer a general inquiry into an unsolved
crime but has begun to focus on a particular suspect, the suspect has been taken into police custody,
the police carry out a process of interrogation that lends itself to eliciting incriminating statements. [
Escobedo v. Illinois, 378 U.S. 478 (1964)]

The rights are not available before police investigators become involved. An audit examiner is not a law
enforcement officer contemplated under this provision. [Navallo v. Sandiganbayan, G.R. No. 97214,
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July 16, 1994]

Our Supreme Court held that these rights are available after the person has been taken into custody or
otherwise deprived of his freedom of action in any significant way. [People v. Loveria, G.R. No. 79138,
July 21, 1990]

Custodial investigation shall include the practice of issuing an invitation to a person who is investigated
in connection with an offense he is suspected to have committed, without prejudice to the liability of the
inviting officer for any violation of law. [R.A.7438]

The said rights are not available to spontaneous statements, not elicited through questioning by the
authorities but given in an ordinary manner whereby the suspect orally admitted having committed the
offense. Neither can it apply to admissions or confessions made by a suspect before he was placed
under custodial investigation. [People v. Baloloy, G.R. No. 140740, April 12, 2002]

A police line-up is not considered a part of any custodial investigation, because it is conducted before
that stage of investigation is reached. [People v. Bravo, G.R. No. 135562, November 22, 1999] This is
because in a police line-up, the process has not yet shifted from the investigatory to the accusatory
stage, and it is usually the witness or the complaint who is interrogated and who gives a statement in the
course of the line-up. [People v. Amestuzo, G.R. No. 104383, July 12, 2001]

Right to be informed

The right of a person under interrogation "to be informed" implies a correlative obligation on the part of
the police investigator to explain, and contemplates an effective communication that results in
understanding what is conveyed. [People v. Nicandro, G.R. No. L-59378, February 11, 1986]

Short of this, there is a denial of the right, as it cannot truly be said that the person has been "informed"
of his rights. Now, since the right "to be informed" implies comprehension, the degree of explanation
required will necessary vary, depending upon the education, intelligence and other relevant personal
circumstances of the person under investigation. Suffice it to say that a simpler and more lucid
explanation is needed where the subject is unlettered. [People v. Sayaboc, G.R.147201, January 15,
2004]

Right to counsel

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The right to counsel attaches upon the start of the investigation. At that point, the person being
interrogated must be assisted by counsel to avoid the pernicious practice of extorting false or coerced
admissions from the lips of the person undergoing investigation. [Gamboa v. Cruz, G.R. No. L-56291,
June 27, 1988]

The right to counsel is intended to preclude the slightest coercion as would lead the accused to admit
something false. [Nachura, Outline Reviewer in Political law (2009)]

The desired role of lawyers in the process of custodial investigation is rendered meaningless if the
lawyer merely gives perfunctory advice as opposed to meaningful advocacy of the rights of the persons
undergoing questioning. If the advice given is so cursory as to be useless, voluntariness is impaired. [
People v. Suela, G.R. No. 133570, January 15, 2002]

A lawyer provided by the investigators is deemed engaged by the accused when he does not raise any
objection against the counsel’s appointment during the course of the investigation, and the accused
thereafter subscribes to the veracity of the statement before the swearing officer. [People v. Mojello,
G.R. No. 145566, March 9, 2004]

Waiver

These rights cannot be waived except in writing and in the presence of counsel. [Section 12 (1), Article
III, 1987 Constitution]

The right to counsel may be waived but the waiver shall not be valid unless made with the assistance of
counsel. Any statement obtained in violation of the procedure herein laid down, whether exculpatory or
inculpatory, in whole or in part, shall be inadmissible in evidence. [People v. Galit, G.R. No. L-51770,
March 20, 1985]

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