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DEMURRER TO EVIDENCE
2
Where the evidence for the prosecution fails to establish even the
commission of the crime and the existence of the elements thereof, the accused
may demur from the evidence presented, as provided under Section 23, Rule
119 of the Revised Rules of Criminal Procedure, thus:
“Sec. 23. After the prosecution rests its case, the court may dismiss the
action on the ground of insufficiency of evidence (1) on its own initiative after
giving the prosecution the opportunity to be heard or (2) upon demurrer to
evidence filed by the accused with or without leave of court.
x x x”
In the instant case, the prosecution failed to establish that the elements
constituting violation of Sections 5 and 11, Article II of R.A. 9165
(Comprehensive Dangerous Drugs Act of 2002” exist. Thus, this demurrer to
evidence.
ARGUMENTS/DISCUSSION
(Copy informations)
Testimonies full of
1
G.R. No. 173480, February 25, 2009.
3
During the trial of the case, the prosecution was able to present four (4)
witnesses, namely:
The testimony of Pat. Fajardo as to the conduct of the operation, from the
time the information was relayed by a confidential asset, to the alleged
surveillance and the actual buy-bust operation had been littered with
loopholes and inconsistencies, that rendered the operation suspect. The
alleged buy-bust operation was conducted with the aid of a confidential
asset, whose knowledge about drug personalities was, according to the
witness, merely on account of the asset’s being “tsimoso”.
A buy-bust operation is a form of entrapment, which in recent years has been accepted as a valid means of
arresting violators of the Dangerous Drugs Law. It is commonly employed by police officers as an effective way
of apprehending law offenders in the act of committing a crime. In a buy-bust operation, the idea to commit a
crime originates from the offender, without anybody inducing or prodding him to commit the offense. Its opposite
is instigation or inducement, wherein the police or its agent lures the accused into committing the offense in order
to prosecute him. Instigation is deemed contrary to public policy and considered an absolutory cause.
To determine whether there was a valid entrapment or whether proper procedures were undertaken in
effecting the buy-bust operation, it is incumbent upon the courts to make sure that the details of the
operation are clearly and adequately laid out through relevant, material and competent evidence. For, the
courts could not merely rely on but must apply with studied restraint the presumption of regularity in the
performance of official duty by law enforcement agents. This presumption should not by itself prevail
over the presumption of innocence and the constitutionally protected rights of the individual. It is the duty
of courts to preserve the purity of their own temple from the prostitution of the criminal law through lawless
enforcement. Courts should not allow themselves to be used as instruments of abuse and injustice lest innocent
persons are made to suffer the unusually severe penalties for drug offenses.
In People v. Doria, we stressed the "objective" test in buy-bust operations. We ruled that in such
operations, the prosecution must present a complete picture detailing the transaction, which "must start
from the initial contact between the poseur-buyer and the pusher, the offer to purchase, the promise or
payment of the consideration until the consummation of the sale by the delivery of the illegal drug
subject of the sale. We emphasized that the manner by which the initial contact was made, the offer to
purchase the drug, the payment of the 'buy-bust' money, and the delivery of the illegal drug must be the
subject of strict scrutiny by courts to insure that law-abiding citizens are not unlawfully induced to
commit an offense."
In the case at bar, the prosecution evidence about the buy-bust operation is incomplete. The confidential
informant who had sole knowledge of how the alleged illegal sale of shabu started and how it was perfected was
not presented as a witness. His testimony was given instead by SPO1 Gonzales who had no personal
knowledge of the same. On this score, SPO1 Gonzales' testimony is hearsay and possesses no probative value
unless it can be shown that the same falls within the exception to the hearsay rule. To impart probative value to
these hearsay statements and convict the appellant solely on this basis would be to render nugatory his
constitutional right to confront the witness against him, in this case the informant, and to examine him for his
truthfulness. As the prosecution failed to prove all the material details of the buy-bust operation, its claim that
there was a valid entrapment of the appellants must fail. (Emphases supplied, citations omitted.)”
“In cases of illegal sale and illegal possession of dangerous drugs, the dangerous drug seized from the accused
constitutes the corpus delicti of the offense. Thus, it is of utmost importance that the integrity and identity of the
seized drugs must be shown to have been duly preserved. "The chain of custody rule performs this function as it
ensures that unnecessary doubts concerning the identity of the evidence are removed."”
2
Calma vs. People of the Philippines, G.R. No. 180586, November 20, 2017.
3
G.R. No. 231989, September 04, 2018.
5
What constitutes the first link is described quite succinctly in People vs.
Villar:4
In this case, the arresting officer who allegedly seized the drugs admitted
that the marking of the evidence was not done immediately upon arrest of
the accused. Police Officer Fajardo declared in his direct examination:
Q: Before you brought him to the police stteion, what did you do
to him if any?
A: We conducted the inventory of the seized items, ma’am.
Q: What were those seized items that you are referring to?
4
G.R. No. 215937, 9 November 2016.
7
COURT TO WITNESS
Q: Four or three?
A: Four (4), Your Honor.
From his direct testimony, it appears that the marking was not done
immediately after its confiscation. This was affirmed by the witness
during his cross-examination:
ATTY. CRUZ:
Q: Mr. Witness, you also stated that you were the one, you were
the only one, who handles (sic) the drug evidence in this case?
A: Yes, ma’am.
Q: And from the time that were handed, the one that you
allegedly bought, to the time that you frisked the accused in this case until
the time of the arrival of the required witnesses, they were all unmarked?
A: No markings yet, Ma’am.
Upon the Honorable Court’s clarificatory questions, the witness gave the
same information:
COURT TO WITNESS:
Q: Where did you conduct the marking, Mr. Witness?
A: At the place of the incident, your Honor.
The breaches further widened when the second link collapsed in its
entirety. In People of the Philippines vs. del Rosario, 6 the Supreme Court
reiterated:
In this case, the identity of the investigating officer is established. His possession of
the seized drugs is documented. However, there appears to be a glaring discrepancy
between what has been established by the investigating officer and what the arresting
officers narrated: the time of the alleged turn-over of the drug specimen.
5
G.R. No. 212994, January 31, 2018.
6
G.R. No. 235658, June 22, 2020.
9
With the gaps in the chain of custody unbridged in the first two links, it
follows that the examination of the forensic chemist of the specimen
turned over to her becomes suspect. There had been no insulation
against tampering from the very beginning, there is no assurance that the
specimen which the forensic chemist examined had been actually seized
from the accused. There is no moral certainty that the drug specimen
presented before the Honorable Court had really been recovered from the
accused.
The possibility that the sachets confirmed to contain illegal substances after
examination by the forensic chemist and presented to the Honorable Court are
not the same ones seized by the arresting officers and turned over to the
investigator stares at the face, fuming misgivings as to their identity. Lescano
vs. People of the Philippines7 is enlightening:
Prosecution’s evidence
Insufficient
12
The holding in People vs. Andaya9 provides the denouement for the
accused-movant’s arguments:
In the instant case, the relation of the drugs presented and offered in
evidence by the prosecution to the ones allegedly seized from the accused is
consumed in a dark cloud of doubt. Compliance with the mandatory
requirements of Section 21 of RA 9165 is plainly lacking, as the witnesses were
unable to satisfactorily justify deviation from the accepted norms of
engagement. And more importantly, the chain of custody of the seized drug
evidence – the element that proves corpus delicti – had gaps unbridged from the
first link to the last.
8
Supra, note 1.
9
G.R. No. 183700, 13 October 2014.
13
PRAYER
Copy furnished:
0.
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