LUIS M. ZALDIVIA vs HON. ANDRES REYES, JR, et al., G.R.
No. 102342, July 3, 1992, EN BANC (Cruz, J.) Facts: Petitioner Zaldivia is charged with quarrying for commercial purposes without a mayor'spermit in the municipality of Rodriguez, Province of Rizal. She moved to quash the information on the ground that the crime had prescribed but it was denied. She appealed to the RTC and denial was sustained by the respondent judge. Petitioner filed for a petition for review on certiorari arguing that the case filed against her is govern by the provisions on the Rules of Summary Procedure. She contends that criminal cases like violations of municipal or city ordinances does not require preliminary investigation and shall be filed directly to the court and not in the Prosecutors office. She also invoked ActNo. 3226 An Act to Establish Periods of Prescription for Violations Penalized by Special Acts and Municipal Ordinances and to Provide when Prescription Shall Begin to Run. Concluding that the case should have been dismissed since the case against her was being filed in court way beyond the 2 month statutory period. The prosecution contends that when the case was filed on the Prosecutors office it suspends the prescriptive period. Issue: Whether or not the prescription of period ceased to run when the case was filed in the prosecutors office? Held: NO, the case is covered by the Rules of Summary Procedure. The filing of the case with the fiscals office does not interrupt the running of the prescriptive period. It should be the filing of the case before the court which will interrupt.
As it is clearly provided in the Rule on Summary
Procedure that among the offenses it covers are violations of municipal or city ordinances, it should follow that the charge against the petitioner, which is for violation of a municipal ordinance of Rodriguez, is governed by that rule on summary procedure and not Section 1 of Rule 110. At any rate, the Court feels that if there be a conflict between the Rule on Summary Procedure and Section 1 of Rule 110 of the Rules on Criminal Procedure, the former should prevail as the special law. And if there be a conflict between Act. No. 3326 and Rule 110 of the Rules on Criminal Procedure, the latter must again yield because this Court, in the exercise of its rule-making power, is not allowed to "diminish, increase or modify substantive rights" under Article VIII, Section 5(5) of the Constitution. Prescription in criminal cases is a substantive right.
The Court realizes that under the above interpretation, a
crime may prescribe even if the complaint is filed seasonably with the prosecutor's office if, intentionally or not, he delays the institution of the necessary judicial proceedings until it is too late. However, that possibility should not justify a misreading of the applicable rules beyond their obvious intent as reasonably deduced from their plain language. The remedy is not a distortion of the meaning of the rules but a rewording thereof to prevent the problem here sought to be corrected.
The courts conclusion is that the prescriptive period for
the crime imputed to the petitioner commenced from its
alleged commission on May 11, 1990, and ended two
months thereafter, on July 11, 1990, in accordance with Section 1 of Act No. 3326. It was not interrupted by the filing of the complaint with the Office of the Provincial Prosecutor on May 30, 1990, as this was not a judicial proceeding. The judicial proceeding that could have interrupted the period was the filing of the information with the Municipal Trial Court of Rodriguez, but this was
done only on October 2, 1990, after the crime had already
prescribed. WHEREFORE, the petition is GRANTED, and the challenged Order dated October 2, 1991 is SET ASIDE. Criminal Case No. 90-089 in the Municipal Trial Court of Rodriguez, Rizal, is hereby DISMISSED on the ground of prescription. It is so ordered.
G.R. No. 207805, November 22, 2017 - PEOPLE OF THE PHILIPPINES, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. CESAR BALAO Y LOPEZ, Accused-Appellant. - NOVEMBER 2017 - PHILIPPINE SUPREME COURT JURISPRUDENCE - CHANROBLES VIRTUAL LAW LIBRARY
Edward Sistrunk v. Donald Vaughn, Superintendent, Sci Graterford Attorney General of The Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and The District Attorney of Philadelphia County, 96 F.3d 666, 3rd Cir. (1996)
Rusty Allen Bennett, Individually and on Behalf of Himself and Other Inmates of the Jail v. Robert Westfall, Individually and in His Official Capacity as Sheriff of Jackson County, West Virginia, Stan Rawlings, Individually and in His Official Capacity as Jackson County Commissioner and Representative of All Other Members of the Commission, Roger Fisher, Individually and in His Official Capacity as Jackson County Commissioner and President of the Jackson County Commission, and as Representative of All Other Members of the Commission, Emerson Snyder, Individually and in His Official Capacity as Jackson County Commissioner, and as Representative of All Other Members of the Commission, Jackson County Commission, Rick Casto, Individually and in His Official Capacity as Jailer, Annable Durst, Individually and in Her Official Capacity as Clerk of the Jackson County Commission, 836 F.2d 1342, 4th Cir. (1988)