Facts:

Accused-appellants Alex Mijaque and Alfonso Patalin, Jr, were charged before Branch
25 of the Regional Trial Court of the 6th Judicial Region stationed in Iloilo City, with
the crime of robbery. The Amended information was dated October 11, 1985.
In a Second Amended Information also dated October 11, 1985 and docketed as
Criminal Case No. 18305, accused-appellants Alex Mijaque, Alfonso Patalin, Jr., and
Nestor Ras were charged before the same court with the crime of robbery with multiple
rape.
They were convicted of robbery with multiple rape committed in the evening of August
11, 1984 against the Aliman family. They were meted the death penalty. At the time
the crimes were committed in 1984, robbery with rape was punishable by death,
however, by virtue of the ratification of the 1987 Constitution, the death penalty was
abolished and all death penalties already imposed were reduced to reclusion perpetua.
In 1987, when the 1987 Constitution suspended the imposition of the death penalty,
the trial has not yet been finished, hence, it was overtaken by the Death Penalty Law
effective January 1, 1994. Appellants now opposed that the trial court erred in
imposing the death penalty as the same was suspended upon ratification of the
constitution.
Issue
Whether or not the death penalty can be imposed upon the accused.
Held:
No. The Supreme Court ruled that before the 1987 Constitution, death penalty as a
capital punishment could be imposed on certain heinous crimes like robbery with rape
(Article 294, Revised Penal Code). From 1987, however, until the passage of the death
penalty law or on January 1, 1994, the imposition of death penalty was suspended. In
the case of the three convicts, an issue came up regarding the imposition of death
penalty. Although the time of the effectivity of the 1987 Constitution the present case
was still its trial stage.
According to Article 22 of the Revised Penal Code, the penal laws shall have a
retroactive effect only insofar as they favor a person guilty of a felony who is not a
habitual criminal, although at the time of the publication of such a law a final sentence
has been pronounced and the convict is serving the same.
The abolition of the death penalty benefits herein accused by virtue of Art 22 of the
RPC which provides that penal laws shall have retroactive effect insofar as they favor
the person guilty of the felony who is not a habitual criminal. Hence, they are subject
to a reduction of penalty from death to reclusion perpetua. A subsequent statute cannot
be applied retroactively as to impair a right that accrued under the old law.