PEOPLE VS MABUG-AT (Digest)

 PEOPLE VS  MABUG-AT

G.R. No. L-25459 

Facts: 

The accused and Juana Buralo was sweethearts. Juana had been jealous of the accused on account of the latter having frequently visited the house of another girl. The accused invited Juana to take a walk on the afternoon of August 9, 1925. Juana refused him, later sending him a note of excuse. On the third day, the accused went to the threshold of Cirilo Banyan's house where Juana Buralo had gone to take part in some devotion. There the accused, revolver in hand, requested Francisco Abellon to ask Juana to come downstairs and as Abellon refused to do so, the accused said: "If you do not want to go upstairs, I will get Juana and if anyone tries to defend her I will kill him."

The accused waited until Juana and her niece Perfecta Buralo came downstairs, when they went in the direction of their house. The accused, who was seen by the two, followed them without saying a word. The houses being adjacent. As the two girls were going upstairs, the accused, while standing at the foot of the stairway, fired a shot from his revolver which wounded Perfecta Buralo, the bullet passing through a part of her neck, and coming out through the left eye, which was completely destroyed. Due to proper medical attention, Perfecta Buralo did not die and is one of the witnesses who testified at the trial of this case.

The defense, without abandoning its allegation that the accused is not responsible for the crime, contends that the crime proven is not frustrated murder but the discharge of a firearm, with injuries, it not having been proven that it was the accused's intention to kill.

Issue: 

Whether or not the accused is guilty with frustrated murder?

Held: 

Yes.

Ratio:  

The relations existing between the accused and Juana Buralo, his disappointment at her not accepting his invitation to take a walk, the fact that the accused, revolver in hand, went to look for Juana Buralo at the house where the devotion was being held, later following her to her house, and especially having aimed at her person--the head--are facts which, in our opinion, permit of no other conclusion than that, in firing the shot, it was the accused's intention to kill.

In the decision of this court in the case of United States vs. Montenegro (15 Phil., 1), it was held:

We do not doubt that there may be cases wherein the discharge of a firearm at another is not in itselfsufficient to sustain a finding of the intention to kill, and there are many cases in the books wherein the attendant circumstances conclusively establish that on discharging a firearm at another the actor was not in fact animated by the intent to kill. But, in seeking to ascertain the intention with which a specific act is committed, it is always proper and necessary to look not merely to the act itself but to all the attendant circumstances so far as they are developed by the evidence; and where, as in the case at bar, a revolver is twice discharged point-blank at the body of another, and the shots directed at the most vital parts of the body, it needs but little additional evidence to establish the intent to kill beyond a reasonable doubt.

The fact that a person received the shot which was intended for another, does not alter his criminal liability. (Art. 1, par. 3, Penal Code.)

the fact is that treachery was proven and must be taken into consideration in this case, because the accused fired at Perfecta Buralo, employing means which tended to insure the execution of the crime without running any risk himself from anyone who might attempt to defend the said offended party. The treachery which, according to the evidence, would have attended the crime had the bullet hit Juana Buralo was present in this case because the offended party Perfecta Buralo and Juana were going upstairs with their backs towards the accused when he fired his revolver.

The crime now before us is frustrated murder, the accused having intended to kill and performed all the acts of execution, which would have produced the crime of murder but which, nevertheless, did not produce it by reason of causes independent of his will. (Art. 3, Penal Code.)