FIRST DIVISION
|
PRESIDENTIAL
AD HOC FACT- FINDING COMMITTEE ON BEHEST LOANS, represented by MAGDANGAL B. ELMA, PCGG CHAIRMAN AND ORLANDO
C. SALVADOR AS CONSULTANT OF THE TECHNICAL WORKING GROUP OF THE AD-HOC
COMMITTEE,
Petitioners,
-versus- HONORABLE
ANIANO A. DESIERTO AS OMBUDSMAN, PANFILO O. DOMINGO, CONRADO S. REYES,
ENRIQUE M. HERBOZA, MOHAMMAD ALI DIMAPORO, ABDULLAH DIMAPORO AND AMER
DIANALAN, Respondents. |
G.R.
No. 135715 Present:
Chairperson
LEONARDO-DE CASTRO,
PERALTA,*
PEREZ, JJ. Promulgated: April 13, 2011 |
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D E C I S I O N
PEREZ, J.:
This
petition for review on certiorari[1] is one among the 17 cases filed before
us by the Presidential Ad Hoc Fact-Finding Committee on Behest Loans, charging
public respondent Ombudsman Aniano A. Desierto (Ombudsman) for grave abuse of
discretion, when, on the ground of prescription and insufficiency of evidence,
he dismissed all of these cases then pending before him, including this case in
OMB-0-97-1718.
The
Facts
Respondents Mohammad Ali Dimaporo,
Abdullah Dimaporo, and Amer Dianalan, were stockholders and officers of the
Mindanao Coconut Oil Mills (MINCOCO), a domestic corporation established in
1974,[2]
while respondents Panfilo O. Domingo, Conrado S. Reyes, Enrique M. Herboza, and
Ricardo Sunga, were then officers of the National Investment and Development
Corporation (NIDC).
On 10 May 1976, MINCOCO applied for a
Guarantee Loan Accommodation with the NIDC for the amount of approximately P30,400,000.00, which the NIDC’s Board of Directors
approved on 23 June 1976.
The guarantee loan was, however, both
undercapitalized and under-collateralized because MINCOCO’s paid capital then
was only P7,000,000.00 and its assets
worth is P7,000,000.00.
This notwithstanding, MINCOCO further
obtained additional Guarantee Loan Accommodations from NIDC in the amount of P13,647,600.00 and P7,000,000.00,[3]
respectively.
When
MINCOCO’s mortgage liens were about to be foreclosed by the government banks
due its outstanding obligations, Eduardo Cojuangco issued a memorandum dated 18
July 1983, bearing the late President Ferdinand E. Marcos’ (President Marcos)
marginal note, disallowing the foreclosure of MINCOCO’s properties.[4]
The government banks were not able to recover any amount from MINCOCO and
President Marcos’ marginal note was construed by the NIDC to have effectively
released MINCOCO, including its owners, from all of its financial liabilities.[5]
The above mentioned transactions,
were, however, discovered only in 1992 after then President Fidel V. Ramos
(President Ramos), in an effort to recover the ill-gotten wealth of the late President
Marcos, his family, and cronies, issued Administrative Order No. 13[6]
creating the Presidential Ad Hoc Fact-Finding Committee on Behest Loans (the Committee), with the Chairman of
the Philippine Commission on Good Government (PCGG) as the Committee’s head. The Committee was directed, inter alia, to inventory all behest
loans, and identify the lenders and borrowers, including the principal officers
and stockholders of the borrowing firms, as well as the persons responsible for
the granting of loans or who influenced the grant thereof.[7] Subsequently, then President Ramos issued
Memorandum Order No. 61[8]
outlining the criteria which may be utilized as a frame of reference in
determining a behest loan, viz:
a.
It
is under-collateralized;
b.
The
borrower corporation is undercapitalized;
c.
Direct
or indirect endorsement by high government officials like presence of marginal
note;
d.
Stockholders,
officers or agents of the borrower corporation are identified as cronies;
e.
Deviation
of use of loan proceeds from the purpose intended;
f.
Use
of corporate layering;
g.
Non-feasibility
of the project for which financing is being sought;
h.
Extraordinary
speed in which the loan release was made.
The
Committee found that twenty-one (21) corporations, including MINCOCO, obtained
behest loans. It claimed that the fact that MINCOCO was under-collateralized
and undercapitalized; that its officers were identified as cronies; that the
late President Marcos had marginal note, effectively waiving the government’s
right to foreclose MINCOCO’s mortgage liens; and, that the Guarantee Loan
Accommodation were approved in an extraordinary speed of one month, bore badges
of behest loans.
Subsequently,
the Committee filed with the Ombudsman a sworn complaint against MINCOCO’s Officers
and NIDC’s Board of Directors for violation of Section 3(e) and (g) of Republic
Act No. 3019,[9] as amended.
By
Resolution dated 9 July 1998, the Ombudsman motu
prorio dismissed the complaint on the grounds that, first, there was insufficient evidence to warrant the indictment of
the persons charged; and, second, the
alleged offenses had prescribed.[10] The Ombudsman explained:
Being undercapitalized, standing
alone is meaningless. The approval of the loans/guarantees was still based on
sound lending practice, otherwise, MINCOCO would have been disqualified from
obtaining the same. If MINCOCO’s equity was more than the amount of the loans,
there was no need for it to obtain the latter.
Anent the claim that Mohammad Ali
Dimaporo was a crony of the late President Marcos, no evidence was adduced to
prove the same, hence, remains a bare allegation. x x x.
On the issue that the notation by
President Marcos in the Memorandum of July 18, 1983 is a behest order, suffice
it to state that these marginal notes, if they meant endorsement as defined
under Memorandum Order No. 61, endorsed the recommendation regarding the
mortgage liens of the government banks of the Mothballed Coconut Oil Mills and
not the approval/grant of the loans/guarantees in 1976. It is in effect approved the release of the liabilities of the former
owners of coconut oil mills, one of which was MINCOCO, but not the
acquisition of the said loans/guarantees.
The take over of MINCOCO by
UNICOM without the consent of NIDC is not a characteristic of a behest loan. It is a mere violation of procedures that
does not warrant a criminal action.
x x x x
For the perpetration of the acts
being complained of, the respondents are charged of violations of Sections 3(e)
and (g) of Republic Act No. 3019. The instant case however will no longer
prosper for the offenses have already prescribed.
Be it remembered that MINCOCO
applied for and was granted loans/guarantees way back in 1976. Thus, these acts
are governed by the law in force at the time of their commission, which is the
old R.A. No. 3019 before its amendment by Batas
Pambansa Blg. 195 in March 1982. Offenses perpetrated prior to the
enactment of this latter law prescribed ten (10) years later. And since the
case was filed against the herein respondents only in September 1997, the
offenses have long prescribed in 1986.
Prescription commenced to run in
1976 when the assailed transaction happened. x x x.[11]
Hence,
this petition for review on certiorari
under Rule 45 of the Rules of Court.[12]
The petitioner argued that the right
of the State to recover behest loans as ill-gotten wealth is imprescriptible
under Section 15, Article XI of the 1987 Constitution;[13]
and, assuming that the period to file criminal charges herefore is subject to
prescription, the prescriptive period should be counted from the time of
discovery of behest loans or sometime in 1992 when the Committee was
constituted.[14]
The Ombudsman, in his Comment,
countered that his office has the discretionary power during preliminary
investigation to determine the sufficiency of evidence for indictment;[15]
that it is beyond the ambit of the Court to review this exercise of discretion;[16]
that Section 15, Article XI of the 1987 Constitution applies only to civil
suits and not to criminal proceedings;[17]
and, that the crime under which the respondents herein were charged had already
prescribed.[18]
Private respondents Panfilo O. Domingo
and Enrique M. Herboza, filed their respective Comments mainly reiterating the
Ombudsman’s contentions. The other respondents did not file their Comments,
and, thus, considered to have waived their chance thereto.
The
Court’s Ruling
The
remedy from an adverse resolution of the Ombudsman is a petition for certiorari under Rule 65 of the Rules of
Court; what was filed with the Court, however, was a petition for review on certiorari under Rule 45. Nevertheless, the Court will treat this
petition as one filed under Rule 65 since a reading of its contents shows that
the Committee imputes grave abuse of discretion to the Ombudsman for dismissing
the complaint.[19] This was how we also treated the previous
cases marred by the same procedural lapse, the latest of which is the 2009 Presidential Ad-Hoc Fact Finding Committee
on Behest Loans v. Desierto (G.R. No. 135703).[20]
At
the core of the controversy is the Ombudsman’s Resolution holding that
prescription had already set-in effectively barring the institution of charges
against the private respondents. The
Ombudsman claimed that the alleged behest loans, transpired in 1976,[21]
and, thus, the complaint filed after more than two decades from the commission
thereof or on 8 October 1997, was well beyond the 10-year prescriptive period
provided for under the old Republic Act No. 3019.[22]
In
resolving the issue of prescription, the following shall be considered: (1) the
period of prescription for the offense charged; (2) the time the period of
prescription started to run; and (3) the time the prescriptive period was
interrupted.[23]
At
the outset, the provision found in Section 15, Article XI of the 1987 Constitution
that “the right of the State to recover properties unlawfully acquired by
public officials or employees, from them or from their nominees or transferees,
shall not be barred by prescription, laches
or estoppels,” has already been settled in Presidential
Ad Hoc Fact-Finding Committee on Behest Loans v. Desierto (G.R. No. 130140),[24]
where the Court held that the above cited constitutional provision “applies
only to civil actions for recovery of ill-gotten wealth, and not to criminal
cases.”[25]
The period of
prescription for the crime charged in this petition, committed in 1976 and
prior to the amendment of Republic Act No. 3019, is ten (10) years.
Section
11[26]
of Republic Act No. 3019 as amended by Batas
Pambansa Blg. 195, provides that the offenses committed under Republic Act
No. 3019 shall prescribe in fifteen (15) years; prior to this amendment,
however, under the old Republic Act No. 3019, this prescriptive period was only
ten (10) years. In People v. Pacificador,[27]
the Court held that the longer prescriptive period of 15-years does not apply
in crimes committed prior to the effectivity of Batas Pambansa Blg. 195, which was approved on 16 March 1982, because, not being favorable to the accused, it
cannot be given retroactive effect. Considering
that the alleged crime was committed in 1976, and in line with the Court’s
ruling in Pacificador, the
prescription period should be ten (10) years.
Prescription of
crime shall begin to run from the day of its commission, and if the same be not
known at the time, from the discovery thereof and the institution of judicial
proceedings for its investigation and punishment.
While
we sustain the Ombudsman’s contention that the prescriptive period for the
crime charged herein is 10 years and not 15 years, we are not persuaded that in
this specific case, the prescriptive period began to run in 1976, when the
loans were transacted.
The
time as to when the prescriptive period starts to run for crimes committed
under Republic Act No. 3019, a special law, is covered by Act No. 3326,[28]
Section 2 of which provides that:
Section 2. Prescription shall
begin to run from the day of the commission of the violation of the law, and if the same be not known at the time,
from the discovery thereof and the institution of judicial proceedings for
its investigation and punishment.
The prescription shall be
interrupted when proceedings are instituted against the guilty person, and
shall begin to run again if the proceedings are dismissed for reasons not
constituting double jeopardy.
Generally,
the prescriptive period shall commence to run on the day the crime is
committed. That an aggrieved person
“entitled to an action has no knowledge of his right to sue or of the facts out
of which his right arises,” does not prevent the running of the prescriptive
period.[29] An exception to this rule is the “blameless ignorance” doctrine,
incorporated in Section 2 of Act No. 3326. Under this doctrine, “the statute of
limitations runs only upon discovery of the fact of the invasion of a right
which will support a cause of action. In
other words, the courts would decline to apply the statute of limitations where the plaintiff does not know or has no
reasonable means of knowing the existence of a cause of action.”[30] It was in this accord that the Court
confronted the question on the running of the prescriptive period in People v. Duque[31]
which became the cornerstone of our 1999 Decision in Presidential Ad Hoc Fact-Finding Committee on Behest Loans v. Desierto (G.R.
No. 130149),[32] and the subsequent cases[33]
which Ombudsman Desierto dismissed, emphatically, on the ground of prescription
too. Thus, we held in a catena of cases,[34]
that if the violation of the special law was not known at the time of its
commission, the prescription begins to run only from the discovery thereof, i.e., discovery of the unlawful nature
of the constitutive act or acts.
Corollary,
it is safe to conclude that the prescriptive period for the crime which is the
subject herein, commenced from the date of its discovery in 1992 after the
Committee made an exhaustive investigation.[35] When the complaint was filed in 1997, only
five years have elapsed, and, hence, prescription has not yet set in. The rationale
for this was succinctly discussed in the 1999 Presidential Ad Hoc Fact-Finding Committee on Behest Loans,[36]
that “it was well-high impossible for the State, the aggrieved party, to have
known these crimes committed prior to the 1986 EDSA Revolution, because of the
alleged connivance and conspiracy among involved public officials and the
beneficiaries of the loans.”[37] In yet another pronouncement, in the 2001 Presidential Ad Hoc Fact-Finding Committee
on Behest Loans v. Desierto (G.R. No. 130817),[38]
the Court held that during the Marcos regime, no person would have dared to
question the legality of these transactions.
While the
Ombudsman has the full discretion to determine whether a criminal case is to be
filed, the Court is not precluded from reviewing the Ombudsman’s action when
there is a grave abuse of discretion.
True, the Ombudsman is
a constitutionally created body with constitutionally mandated independence.
Despite this, however, the Ombudsman comes within the purview of the Court’s
power of judicial review[39] –
a peculiar concept of Philippine Ombudsman, embodied in Article VIII, Section 1
of the 1987 Constitution[40] –
which serves as a safety net against its capricious and arbitrary acts.[41] Thus, in Garcia-Rueda v. Pascasio,[42]
the Court held that “while the Ombudsman has the full discretion to determine
whether or not a criminal case is to be filed, the Court is not precluded from
reviewing the Ombudsman’s action when there is grave abuse of discretion.”[43] This is because, “while the Ombudsman enjoys,
as it must, complete independence, it cannot and must not lose track of the
law, which it is bound to uphold and obey.”[44]
After reviewing the
case’s records, the Court finds that the present petition calls for the
exercise of its power of judicial review.
Private respondents are
charged with violation of Section 3(e) and (g) of Republic Act No. 3019 which
states:
Section 3. Corrupt practices
of public officers. - In addition to acts or omissions of public officers
already penalized by existing law, the following shall constitute corrupt
practices of any public officer and are hereby declared to be unlawful:
x x x x
(e)
Causing any undue injury to any party, including the Government, or giving any
private party any unwarranted benefits, advantage or preference in the
discharge of his official administrative or judicial functions through manifest
partiality, evident bad faith or gross inexcusable negligence. This provision
shall apply to officers and employees of offices or government corporations
charged with the grant of licenses or permits or other concessions.
x x x x
(g)
Entering, on behalf of the Government, into any contract or transaction
manifestly and grossly disadvantageous to the same, whether or not the public
officer profited or will profit thereby.
From the 1999 landmark
case of Presidential Ad Hoc Fact-Finding
Committee on Behest Loans v. Desierto (G.R. No. 130140),[45]
to the 2008 Presidential Ad Hoc
Fact-Finding Committee on Behest Loans v. Tabasondra (G.R. No. 133756),[46]
and to the 2009 Presidential Ad Hoc
Fact-Finding Committee on Behest Loans v. Desierto (G.R. No. 135703),[47]
the same issues confronted the Court as the one presented in the present
petition, in that the Ombudsman similarly dismissed these cases not only on the
ground of prescription but also for insufficiency of evidence.[48]
Interestingly, the facts
in Tabasondra[49]
are squarely on all fours as the present case. Tabasondra,[50]
involved Coco-Complex Philippines, Inc., (CCPI), a domestic corporation
primarily incorporated for the manufacture of coconut oil.[51] CCPI applied for Guarantee Loan Accommodation
thru the National Investment Development Corporation amounting to P9,277,080.00, allegedly for the purchase
of an oil mill to be supplied by Krupp P2,111,000.00 paid-up capital,[53]
and under-collateralized with only P495,300.00
assets.[54] Thus, with the NIDC’s Guarantee Loan
Accommodation, the Philippine National Bank (PNB) granted the loan. Still, with NIDC’s guarantee, CCPI obtained
additional loans from PNB in 1972, which, as of 1992, ballooned to P205,889,545.76.
When the Committee
filed criminal complaints against the CCPI’s Officers and PNB’s Board of Directors
for violation of Section 3(e) and (g) of Republic Act No. 3019, the Ombudsman
dismissed the complaint on the ground of prescription. For this, the Committee charged the Ombudsman
for grave abuse of discretion, but pending its resolution before us, the
Ombudsman, taking cue from the Court’s 1999 ruling in G.R. No. 130140,[55] motu proprio reinvestigated the
complaint it earlier dismissed (and was still pending before us), only to
dismiss it anew, in a Resolution dated 16 October 2000, opining that NIDC’s
Board of Directors, who approved the
loans in favor of CCPI, should have been the ones indicted.[56] Subsequently, the Court dismissed Tabasondra for being moot and
academic.
Similarly, in the
present petition, MINCOCO was also granted by NIDC a Guarantee Loan
Accommodation amounting initially to P30.4
million pesos, despite its being undercapitalized and under-collateralized.[57]
As the Ombudsman
admitted, when MINCOCO’s mortgage liens were about to be foreclosed by the
government banks, the late President Marcos intervened and through a marginal
note, in connivance with the NIDC’s officers, waived the liabilities of its
owners to the detriment of the government.[58] It behooves the Court that while the Ombudsman
admitted this fact, it saw nothing wrong in President Marcos’ intervention, and
the involvement therein of the NIDC’s officers. This intervention alone, by no less than the
highest official of the land, waiving a multi-million peso liability of a
private corporation, should have alarmed the Ombudsman.
It surprises us that
while the Ombudsman dismissed Tabasondra
for not impleading therein the NIDC’s Board of Directors, now that they (NIDC’s
Board of Directors) have been impleaded, the Ombudsman still dismissed the
complaint, allegedly for insufficiency of evidence.[59]
Applying mutatis mutandis G.R. No. 133756[60]
in this petition, it is apparent that there can be liability for violation of
Section 3(e) and (g) of Republic Act No. 3019.
Violation of Section
3(e)[61]
of Republic Act No. 3019 requires that there be injury caused by giving
unwarranted benefits, advantages or preferences to private parties who conspire
with public officers. In contrast,
Section 3(g)[62] does not require the
giving of unwarranted benefits, advantages or preferences to private parties,
its core element being the engagement in a transaction or contract that is
grossly and manifestly disadvantageous to the government.
The waiver of MINCOCO’s
multi-peso loan should have been enough basis in finding that probably Section
3(e) of Republic Act No. 3019 was violated and the fact that NIDC extended a
loan guarantee to MINCOCO, despite its being undercapitalized and
under-collateralized, should have also been enough ground in finding probable
cause for violation of Section 3(g) of the above-cited law.
More
importantly, the finding of the Committee that MINCOCO obtained behest loans
because of the following circumstances:
MINCOCO was under-collateralized and undercapitalized; its officers were
identified as cronies; President Marcos had marginal note, effectively waiving
the government’s right to foreclose MINCOCO’s mortgage liens; and, NIDC
approved MINCOCO’s Guarantee Loan Accommodation in an extraordinary speed of
one month, should have been accorded a proper modicum of respect by the
Ombudsman.
Considering the membership of the
Committee – representatives from the Department of Finance, The Philippine
National Bank, the Asset Privatization Trust, the Philippine Export and Foreign
Loan Guarantee Corporation and even the Development Bank of the
The duty of the
Ombudsman in the conduct of a preliminary investigation is to establish whether
there exists probable cause to file information in court against the accused.[64] A finding of probable cause needs only to rest
on evidence showing that more likely than not, the accused committed the crime.[65] Considering the quantum of evidence needed to
support a finding of probable cause, the Court holds that the Ombudsman gravely
abused its discretion when it dismissed the complaint against herein
respondents.
Preliminary
investigation is not the occasion for the full and exhaustive display of the
parties’ evidence.[66] It is for the presentation of such evidence
only as may engender a well founded belief that an offense has been committed
and that the accused is probably guilty thereof.[67] The validity and merits of a party’s
accusation or defense, as well as admissibility of testimonies and evidence,
are better ventilated during the trial proper.[68]
In
conclusion, the offenses ascribed to respondents “involve behest loans which
bled white the economy of the country, one of the excesses of the authoritarian
regime that led to the EDSA revolution, a serious evil that the 1987 Constitution
aimed to extirpate.”[69] It involves nothing less than the interest of
the people whose transgressed rights are supposed to be vindicated by their
protector – the Ombudsman.[70] As protector of the people, the Ombudsman
should be pro-active in making use of its vast arsenal of powers to “bring the
lamp of scrutiny to otherwise dark places even over the resistance of those who
would draw the blinds.”[71]
The
criminal liability of Conrado S. Reyes is hereby extinguished in accordance
with Article 89(1)[72]
of the Revised Penal Code as confirmed by his death certificate.[73] With
respect to respondents Panfilo O. Domingo and Mohammad Ali Dimaporo, the facts
of their deaths have to be confirmed to determine the application to them of the
same provision.
WHEREFORE,
the petition is GRANTED. The Ombudsman is hereby ORDERED to:
1.
DISMISS the complaint against
deceased respondent Conrado S. Reyes;
2.
REQUIRE the counsels of respondents
Panfilo O. Domingo and Mohammad Ali Dimaporo to submit proof of their deaths;
and
3. FILE
with the Sandiganbayan the necessary
Information against respondents Abdullah Dimaporo, Amer Dianalan, Enrique M.
Herboza, and Ricardo Sunga.
SO ORDERED.
|
|
JOSE
|
WE
CONCUR:
RENATO C. CORONA
Chief Justice
Chairperson
TERESITA J. LEONARDO-DE CASTRO DIOSDADO M. PERALTA
Associate Justice Associate Justice
MARIANO C.
Associate Justice
Pursuant to Section
13, Article VIII of the Constitution, it is hereby certified that the
conclusions in the above Decision were reached in consultation before the case
was assigned to the writer of the opinion of the Court.
RENATO C. CORONA
Chief Justice
* Per Raffle dated 12 April 2011,
Associate Justice Diosdado M. Peralta is designated as additional member in
lieu of Associate Justice Presbitero J. Velasco, Jr. inhibition.
[1] Filed under Rule 45 of the Rules
of Court, but treated by the Court as a Petition for Certiorari under Rule 65.
[2] Registered with the Philippine
Securities and Exchange Commission on 30 July 1974. Rollo,
p. 29.
[3] Petition for Review on Certiorari (hereafter, petition).
[4] In 1983, MINCOCO sold all its
shares to the United Coconut Mills (UNICOM), which retained control over the
mothballed oil mills. Petition, id. at 14.
[5] Ombudsman Resolution.
[6] Issued on 8 October 1992.
[7] Administrative Order No.13.
[8] Issued on 9 November 1992.
[9] Section
3. Corrupt practices of public officers. - In addition
to acts or omissions of public officers already penalized by existing law, the
following shall constitute corrupt practices of any public officer and are
hereby declared to be unlawful:
x
x x x
(e)
Causing any undue injury to any party, including the Government, or giving any
private party any unwarranted benefits, advantage or preference in the
discharge of his official administrative or judicial functions through manifest
partiality, evident bad faith or gross inexcusable negligence. This provision
shall apply to officers and employees of offices or government corporations
charged with the grant of licenses or permits or other concessions.
x x x x
(g)
Entering, on behalf of the Government, into any contract or transaction
manifestly and grossly disadvantageous to the same, whether or not the public
officer profited or will profit thereby.
[10] Ombudsman Resolution. Rollo, pp.
28-34.
[11]
[12] Per Order dated 13 August 1998, the
Ombudsman Denied the Motion for Reconsideration filed by the petitioner.
[13] Petition.
[14]
[15] Ombudsman’s Comment.
[16]
[17]
[18]
[19] Presidential
Ad Hoc Fact-Finding Committee on Behest Loans v. Desierto, G.R. No.135703, 15
April 2009, 585 SCRA 18, 28.
[20]
[21] Petition. Rollo, p 13.
[22] The
Anti Graft and Corrupt Practices Act.
[23] Presidential
Ad Hoc Fact-Finding Committee on Behest Loans v. Desierto, G.R. No. 130817,
22 August 2001, 363 SCRA 489, 493.
[24] Presidential
Ad Hoc Fact-Finding Committee on Behest Loans v. Desierto, G.R. No. 130140,
25 October 1999, 317 SCRA 272.
[25]
[26] Section 11. Prescription of Offenses. – All offenses punishable under this Act
shall prescribe in fifteen years.
[27] G.R. No. 139405, 13 March 2001, 354
SCRA 310, 318.
[28] An
Act to Establish Periods of Prescription for Violations Penalized by Special
Act and Municipal Ordinances and to Provide When Prescription shall Begin to
Run.
[29] Then Associate Justice Reynato S.
Puno (Ret.) Concurring and Dissenting Opinion in Presidential Ad Hoc Fact-Finding Committee on Behest Loans v. Desierto,
supra note 24 at 319.
[30]
[31] G.R. No. 100285, 13 August 1992, 212
SCRA 607.
[32] Presidential
Ad Hoc Fact-Finding Committee on Behest Loans v. Desierto, supra note 24.
[33] Presidential
Ad Hoc Fact-Finding Committee on Behest Loans v. Desierto, G.R. 130817, supra
note 23; Presidential Ad Hoc Fact-Finding
Committee on Behest Loans v. Desierto, G.R. No. 135119, 21 October 2004,
441 SCRA 106; Presidential Ad Hoc
Fact-Finding Committee on Behest Loans v. Ombudsman, G.R. No. 135350, 3
March 2006, 484 SCRA 16; Presidential Ad
Hoc Fact-Finding Committee on Behest Loans v. Tabasondra, G.R. No. 133756,
4 July 2008, 557 SCRA 31.
[34] People
v. Duque, supra note 31; Presidential
Ad Hoc Fact-Finding Committee on Behest Loans v. Desierto, supra note 24; Presidential Commission on Good Government
v. Desierto, G.R. No. 140358, 8 December 2000, 347 SCRA 561.
[35] 415 Phil. 723 (2001).
[36] Presidential
Ad Hoc Fact-Finding Committee on Behest Loans v. Desierto, supra note 19.
[37]
[38] Presidential
Ad Hoc Fact-Finding Committee on Behest Loans v. Desierto, supra note 23.
[39] M. Maulion, Power and Paradox: Deconstructing Ombudsman
[40]
[41]
[42] G.R. No. 118141, 5 September 1997, 278
SCRA 769 at 776 cited in M. Maulion, Power
and Paradox: Deconstructing Ombudsman
[43]
[44]
[45] Presidential
Ad Hoc Fact-Finding Committee on Behest Loans v. Desierto, supra note 24.
[46] Supra note 33.
[47] Presidential
Ad Hoc Fact-Finding Committee on Behest Loans v. Desierto, supra note 19.
[48]
[49] Presidential
Ad Hoc Fact-Finding Committee on Behest Loans v. Tabasondra, supra note 33.
[50]
[51]
[52]
[53] As of 31 December 1969, id. at 36.
[54]
[55] Presidential
Ad Hoc Fact-Finding Committee on Behest Loans v. Desierto, supra note 24.
[56] The Committee questioned the
Ombudsman’s dismissal thereof before the Court which is now pending for
resolution. Supra note 33 at 40.
[57] Ombudsman’s Resolution. Rollo, p. 29.
[58]
[59]
[60] Presidential
As Hoc Fact-Finding Committee on Behest Loans v. Tabasondra, supra note 33.
[61] The elements of the offense in
Section 3(e) are: (1) that the accused are public officers or private persons
charged in conspiracy with them; (2) that said public officers commit the
prohibited acts during the performance of their official duties or in relation
to their public positions; (3) that they cause undue injury to any party,
whether the government or any party; (4) that such injury is caused by giving
unwarranted benefits, advantage or preference to such parties; and (5) that the
public officers have acted with manifest partiality, evident bad faith or gross
inexcusable negligence.
[62] On the other hand, the elements of
the offense in Section 3(g) are: (1) that the accused is a public officer; (2)
that he entered into a contract or transaction on behalf of the government; and
(3) that such contract or transaction is grossly and manifestly disadvantageous
to the government.
[63] Presidential
Ad Hoc Fact-Finding Committee on Behest Loans v. Desierto, supra note 19 at
34.
[64]
[65]
[66]
[67]
[68]
[69] Then Associate Justice Reynato S.
Puno (Ret.) Concurring and Dissenting Opinion in Presidential Ad Hoc Fact-Finding Committee on Behest Loans v. Desierto,
supra note 29 at 323.
[70]
[71] Commenting on the role of Ombudsman,
which was challenged in 1970 in Alberta, Canada, Chief Justice Milvain said “x
x x [h]e can bring the lamp of scrutiny to otherwise dark places even over the
resistance of those who would draw the blinds. x x x.” M. Maulion, Power and Paradox: Deconstructing Ombudsman
[72] Article 89. How criminal liability is totally extinguished. – Criminal
liability is totally extinguished:
1. By the death of the convict, as to the personal penalties; and as to pecuniary penalties, liability therefor is extinguished only when the death of the offender occurs before judgment.
[73] Death
Certificate. Rollo, p. 249.