PEOPLE V.

JUDGE PINEDA AND NAVAL

L-44205, February 11, 1993

FACTS

Private respondent Consolacion Naval was charged with falcification of public document
and estafa, each one was filed in separate courts. She sought the quashal of the crime
of falcification on the supposition that she is in danger of being convicted for the same
felony. The alleged falcification took place in 1971 when private respondent made
untruthful statements in the narration of facts when it executed an Application for
Registration for a parcel of land which she previously sold to another person in 1969.
The alleged estafa took place in 1973 when, having obtained the title for said parcel of
land, Naval once again sold the same, this time to other persons. Judge Gregorio
Pineda who was handling the falcification case granted the motion to quash on the
belief that the alleged falcification was a necessary means of committing estafa. Hence,
this special civil action for certiorari.

ISSUE

Whether the motion to quash based on double jeopardy is tenable.

RULING

No. Double jeopardy will not attach in the instant case and the motion to quash is
untenable.

Assuming that falsification was indeed necessary to commit estafa, which ordinarily

constitutes a complex crime under Article 48 of the Revised Penal Code and thus
susceptible to challenge via a motion to quash under Section 2 (e), Rule 117 vis-a-
vis Section 12, Rule 110 still, it was serious error on the part of Judge Pineda to have
appreciated this discourse in favor of private respondent since this matter was not
specifically raised in the motion to quash on the first instance. It was only in the motion
for reconsideration where private respondent pleaded this additional ground after her
motion to quash was first denied. The legal proscription against entertaining another
saving clause to abate the charge for falsification is very explicit under Section 3, Rule
117 of the Revised Rules of Court.

On the issue of double jeopardy, the court ruled that it is unacceptable to suppose that
private respondent concocted the sinister scheme of falsification in 1971 precisely to
facilitate the commission of estafa in 1973 such that both crimes emanated from a
single criminal impulse. It was similarly fallacious for the lower court to have shared the
notion that private respondent is in danger of being convicted twice for the same
criminal act, a circumstance recognized under Section 2(h) Rule 117 of the Old Rules
as suggested in the motion to quash, because this plea is understood to presuppose
that the other case against private respondent has been dismissed or otherwise
terminated without her express consent, by a court of competent jurisdiction, upon a
valid complaint or information, and after the defendant had pleaded to the charge
( Section 7, Rule 117, 1985 Rules on Criminal Procedure, as amended). The mere filing
of two informations charging the same offense is not an appropriate basis for the
invocation of double jeopardy since the first jeopardy has not yet set in by a previous
conviction, acquittal or termination of the case without the consent of the accused.

-End-