I
Bail hearing was mandatory
in Criminal Case No. 1138-03
Judge Infante would excuse himself from blame and responsibility by insisting that the hearing was no longer necessary considering that the accused had not filed a petition for bail; that inasmuch as no application for bail had been filed by the accused, his twin orders of April 23, 2003 were not orders granting an application for bail, but were instead his approval of the bail bond posted; and that Atty. Gacal’s very urgent motion and other motions and written submissions lacked the requisite written conformity of the public prosecutor, rendering them null and void.
We cannot relieve Judge Infante from blame and responsibility.
The willingness of Judge Infante to rely on the mere representation of the public prosecutor that his grant of bail upon the public prosecutor’s recommendation had been proper, and that his (public prosecutor) recommendation of bail had in effect waived the need for a bail hearing perplexes the Court. He thereby betrayed an uncommon readiness to trust more in the public prosecutor’s judgment than in his own judicious discretion as a trial judge. He should not do so.
Judge Infante made the situation worse by brushing aside the valid remonstrations expressed in Atty. Gacal’s very urgent motion thusly:
This Court is not unaware that the charge of murder being a capital offense is not bailable xxx
xxxx
The phrase “xxx application for admission to bail xxx” is not an irrelevant but a significant infusion in the cited rule (section 8), the plain import of which is that bail hearing is preceded by a motion/petition for admission to bail filed by a detained accused himself or thru counsel.
The peculiar feature of the instant case, however, is the absence of a petition/motion for admission to bail filed by the herein accused. On the contrary, it is the consistent position of the fiscal to recommend bail since the prosecution evidence being merely circumstantial, is not strong for the purpose of granting bail. xxx. This court believes that bail hearing, albeit necessary in the grant of bail involving capital offense, is not at all times and in all instances essential to afford the party the right to due process especially so, when the fiscal in this case was given reasonable opportunity to explain his side, and yet he maintained the propriety of grant of bail without need of hearing since the prosecution evidence is not strong for the purpose of granting bail.
Further, while it is preponderant of judicial experience to adopt the fiscal’s recommendation in bail fixing, this court, however, had in addition and in accord with Section 6(a) of the Revised Rules on Criminal Procedure, evaluated the record of the case, and only upon being convinced and satisfied that the prosecution evidence as contained in the affidavits of all the prosecution witnesses, no one being an eye-witness are merely circumstantial evidence, that this court in the exercise of sound discretion allowed the accused to post bail.
xxxx
The convergence of the foregoing factors - absence of motion for admission to bail filed by the accused, the recommendation of the fiscal to grant bail, the pro forma motion of the private prosecutor for lack of prior approval from the fiscal and this court’s evaluation of the records – sufficiently warrants the grant of bail to herein accused.[14]
Judge Infante specifically cited judicial experience as sanctioning his adoption and approval of the public prosecutor’s recommendation on the fixing of bail. Yet, it was not concealed from him that the public prosecutor’s recommendation had been mainly based on the documentary evidence adduced,[15] and on the public prosecutor’s misguided position that the evidence of guilt was weak because only circumstantial evidence had been presented. As such, Judge Infante’s unquestioning echoing of the public prosecutor’s conclusion about the evidence of guilt not being sufficient to deny bail did not justify his dispensing with the bail hearing.
Judge Infante apparently acted as if the requirement for the bail hearing was a merely minor rule to be dispensed with. Although, in theory, the only function of bail is to ensure the appearance of the accused at the time set for the arraignment and trial; and, in practice, bail serves the further purpose of preventing the release of an accused who may be dangerous to society or whom the judge may not want to release,[16] a hearing upon notice ismandatory before the grant of bail, whether bail is a matter of right or discretion.[17] With more reason is this true in criminal prosecutions of a capital offense, or of an offense punishable by reclusion perpetua or life imprisonment. Rule 114, Section 7 of the Rules of Court, as amended, states that: “No person charged with a capital offense, or an offense punishable byreclusion perpetua or life imprisonment when the evidence of guilt is strong, shall be admitted to bail regardless of the stage of criminal action.”
In Cortes v. Catral,[18] therefore, the Court has outlined the following duties of the judge once an application for bail is filed, to wit:
1. In all cases whether bail is a matter of right or discretion, notify the prosecutor of the hearing of the application for bail or require him to submit his recommendation (Section 18, Rule 114 of the Revised Rules of Court, as amended);
2. Where bail is a matter of discretion, conduct a hearing of the application for bail regardless or whether or not the prosecution refuses to present evidence to show that the guilt of the accused is strong for the purpose of enabling the court to exercise its sound discretion (Sections 7 and 8, id);
3. Decide whether the guilt of the accused is strong based on the summary of evidence of the prosecution;
4. If the guilt of the accused is not strong, discharge the accused upon the approval of the bail bond (Section 19, id); otherwise, the petition should be denied. [emphasis supplied]
II
Judge Infante disregarded rules and guidelines
in Criminal Case No. 1138-03
Ostensibly, Judge Infante disregarded basic but well-known rules and guidelines on the matter of bail.
1.
In case no application for bail is filed,
bail hearing was not dispensable
Judge Infante contends that a bail hearing in Criminal Case No. 1138-03 was not necessary because the accused did not file an application for bail; and because the public prosecutor had recommended bail.
Judge Infante’s contention is unwarranted.
Even where there is no petition for bail in a case like Criminal Case No. 1138-03, a hearing should still be held. This hearing is separate and distinct from the initial hearing to determine the existence of probable cause, in which the trial judge ascertains whether or not there is sufficient ground to engender a well-founded belief that a crime has been committed and that the accused is probably guilty of the crime. The Prosecution must be given a chance to show the strength of its evidence; otherwise, a violation of due process occurs.[19]
The fact that the public prosecutor recommended bail for Ancheta did not warrant dispensing with the hearing. The public prosecutor’s recommendation of bail was not material in deciding whether to conduct the mandatory hearing or not. For one, the public prosecutor’s recommendation, albeit persuasive, did not necessarily bind the trial judge,[20] in whom alone the discretion to determine whether to grant bail or not was vested. Whatever the public prosecutor recommended, including the amount of bail, was non-binding. Nor did such recommendation constitute a showing that the evidence of guilt was not strong. If it was otherwise, the trial judge could become unavoidably controlled by the Prosecution.
Being the trial judge, Judge Infante had to be aware of the precedents laid down by the Supreme Court regarding the bail hearing being mandatory and indispensable. He ought to have remembered, then, that it was only through such hearing that he could be put in a position to determine whether the evidence for the Prosecution was weak or strong.[21] Hence, his dispensing with the hearing manifested a gross ignorance of the law and the rules.
2.
Public prosecutor’s failure to oppose
application for bail or to adduce evidence
did not dispense with hearing
That the Prosecution did not oppose the grant of bail to Ancheta, as in fact it recommended bail, and that the Prosecution did not want to adduce evidence were irrelevant, and did not dispense with the bail hearing. The gravity of the charge in Criminal Case No. 1138-03 made it still mandatory for Judge Infante to conduct a bail hearing in which he could have made on his own searching and clarificatory questions from which to infer the strength or weakness of the evidence of guilt. He should not have readily and easily gone along with the public prosecutor’s opinion that the evidence of guilt, being circumstantial, was not strong enough to deny bail; else, he might be regarded as having abdicated from a responsibility that was his alone as the trial judge.
Judge Infante’s holding that circumstantial evidence of guilt was of a lesser weight than direct evidence in the establishment of guilt was also surprising. His training and experience should have cautioned him enough on the point that the lack or absence of direct evidence did not necessarily mean that the guilt of the accused could not anymore be proved, because circumstantial evidence, if sufficient, could supplant the absence of direct evidence.[22] In short, evidence of guilt was not necessarily weak because it was circumstantial.
Instead, Judge Infante should have assiduously determined why the Prosecution refused to satisfy its burden of proof in the admission of the accused to bail. Should he have found that the public prosecutor’s refusal was not justified, he could have then himself inquired on the nature and extent of the evidence of guilt for the purpose of enabling himself to ascertain whether or not such evidence was strong. He could not have ignored the possibility that the public prosecutor might have erred in assessing the evidence of guilt as weak.[23] At any rate, if he found the Prosecution to be uncooperative, he could still have endeavored to determine on his own the existence of such evidence,[24] with the assistance of the private prosecutor.
3.
Judge Infante’s granting of bail without a hearing was
censurable for gross ignorance of the law and the rules
Every judge should be faithful to the law and should maintain professional competence.[25] His role in the administration of justice requires a continuous study of the law and jurisprudence, lest public confidence in the Judiciary be eroded by incompetence and irresponsible conduct.[26]
In that light, the failure of Judge Infante to conduct a hearing prior to the grant of bail in capital offenses was inexcusable and reflected gross ignorance of the law and the rules as well as a cavalier disregard of its requirement.[27] He well knew that the determination of whether or not the evidence of guilt is strong was a matter of judicial discretion,[28] and that the discretion lay not in the determination of whether or not a hearing should be held, but in the appreciation and evaluation of the weight of the Prosecution’s evidence of guilt against the accused.[29] His fault was made worse by his granting bail despite the absence of a petition for bail from the accused.[30]Consequently, any order he issued in the absence of the requisite evidence was not a product of sound judicial discretion but of whim and caprice and outright arbitrariness.[31]
III
Imposable Penalty
We next determine the penalty imposable on Judge Infante for his gross ignorance of the law and the rules.
The Court imposed a fine of P20,000.00 on the respondent judge inDocena-Caspe v. Bugtas.[32] In that case, the respondent judge granted bail to the two accused who had been charged with murder without first conducting a hearing. Likewise, in Loyola v. Gabo,[33] the Court fined the respondent judge in the similar amount of P20,000.00 for granting bail to the accused in a murder case without the requisite bail hearing. To accord with such precedents, the Court prescribes a fine of P20,000.00 on Judge Infante, with a stern warning that a repetition of the offense or the commission of another serious offense will be more severely dealt with.
WHEREFORE, we FIND AND DECLARE Judge Jaime I. Infante guilty of gross ignorance of the law and the rules; and, accordingly, FINEhim in the amount of P20,000.00, with a stern warning that a repetition of the offense or the commission of another serious offense will be more severely dealt with.
Let a copy of this Decision be furnished to the Office of the Court Administrator for proper dissemination to all trial judges.
SO ORDERED."
