Republic of the Philippines

SUPREME COURT
Manila

EN BANC

G.R. No. L-2647             March 30, 1950

THE PEOPLE OF THE PHILIPPINES, plaintiff-appellee,

Angel S. Alvir for appellant.

MORAN, C.J.:

Appellant Dionisio Serrano y Sandoval was charged in the Court of First Instance of manila, on
October 16, 1948, with the offense of serious physical injuries, alleged to have been inflicted upon
Francisco Augusto the day before or on October 15, 1948. In the information, it was alleged that said
physical injuries "will require medical attendance for a period of more than thirty but less than ninety
days," and ". . . prevented and will prevent the said Francisco Augusto from engaging in his
customary labor for the same period of time."

On October 28, 1948, the accused-appellant was arrested and waiving his right to counsel, entered
a plea of guilty. a few hours later, on the same day, he filed a petition to substitute his plea of guilty
for one not guilty upon the ground that his former plea was entered without the benefit of counsel
and he then entertained the belief that the offended party would pardon him and withdraw the
charge. The motion was denied on the following day, October 29, 1948. On November 5, 1948,
judgment was rendered finding injuries as charged, and sentencing him to six months of arresto
mayor, with the accessories of the law, and to pay the costs. On November 10, 1948, the accused-
appellant filed a motion to reopen the case and that he be allowed to substitute his former plea of
guilty for another plea of guilty but of the lesser offense of slight physical injuries, upon the ground
that the complaint's injuries had not incapacitated him for work and had healed in nine days, instead
of more than thirty days as alleged in the information. To substantiate this ground, the accused-
appellant offered as evidence the body and the testimony of the offended person, Francisco
Augusto, which was rejected by the Court but the affidavit of the offended party which was marked
as Exhibit A was allowed to remain in the record. According to this exhibit, the physical injuries
sustained by Francisco Augusto were cured in about nine days, without incapacitating him for work.
The trial court, however, denied the motion; hence this appeal, with the Solicitor General seconding
appellant's theory.

Under Rule 114, section 6 of the Rules of Court, "the court may in its discretion at any time before
sentence permit a plea of guilty to be withdrawn. If judgment of conviction has been entered thereon
and the same has not become final, the court may set aside such judgment, and allow a plea of not
guilty, or with the consent of the fiscal, allow a plea of guilty of a lesser offense which is necessarily
included in the charge." It is clear from the language of this provision that the withdrawal of the plea
of guilty is not a matter of strict right to the accused but of sound discretion to the trial court, and the
appellate courts should not interfere with such discretion in the absence of a clear abuse thereof.

As a general rule, where it is made to appear that the accused has voluntarily entered a plea of
guilty, with a full realization of its meaning and consequences, and after the same has been clearly
explained to him, the trial court's refusal to allow the withdrawal of the plea should by no means be
disturbed. However, where, as in the instant case, notwithstanding the ordinary precautions that
have been taken, still a clear mistake appears to have been committed in good faith not only by the
accused who was unaided by counsel, but also by the fiscal, including the court itself, with the result
that a serious injustice has been done against the accused who was convicted of an offense that
was graver than the offense which in truth he had committed, it was certainly a clear abuse of
discretion on the part of the court to persist in the mistake thus committed once known and to deny a
relief which under the circumstances was a simple matter of fairness to grant in order to save the
person from the injustice of being convicted of a crime that he had never committed.

The mistake of the court and of both parties in this case was originated by the circumstance that the
gravity of the offense charged was made to depend upon a future event. The information was filed
the day following the commission of the offense, and it was therein alleged that the physical injuries
"will require medical attendance for a period of more than thirty but less than ninety days" and will
prevent the said Francisco Augusto from engaging in his customary labor for the same period of
time." The accused was arraigned on the thirteenth day after the offense committed, and at that time
whether or not the physical injuries would require medical attendance for more than thirty days was
upon the face of the information still a matter of conjecture. The plea of guilty entered by the
accused was indeed an admission of all the material facts pleaded in the information but not of the
conjectures alleged therein. There being an uncertainty in the facts pleaded in the information with
respect to the degree of culpability of the accused, it was the duty of the court to require evidence
and dispel the uncertainty as much as i was possible before fixing the penalties of the imposed. In
that connection, the physician who was attending the offended person and the offended person
himself should have been made to testify. And had this been done, the court would have found that
at the time of the arraignment, the wounds of the offended person had already healed, according to
own affidavit, and that therefore, it was an injustice to convict the accused of the graver offense
charged in the information.

This mistake of the court become more patent when after rendering improvidently a judgment of
conviction for a serious offense its attention was directed by the accused to anew and true fact
showing the offense to be slight. An offer was made to prove the slight offense with the body and
testimony of the offended person himself, to which no rebutting evidence was offered by the
prosecution. And withstanding all this court refused to reopen the case and to allow the withdrawal of
the plea of guilty entered by the accused. We found absolutely no justification for such refusal.

The judgment appealed from is hereby set aside and that case remanded for a new arraignment and
new trial, with the costs de oficio.

Ozaeta, Pablo, Bengzon, Padilla, Tuason, Montemayor, Reyes and Torres, JJ., concur.