Baleros v. People

In the early morning of December 13, 1991, a medical student at the University of Santo Tomas was asleep in her unit at the Celestial Marie Building in Sampaloc, Manila, with her maid sleeping outside her bedroom door. She woke to a cloth soaked in chemical being pressed on her face by someone pinning her to the bed. She struggled and kicked until one hand came free, then grabbed and squeezed her attacker's sex organ, and he let her go. She could not identify him in the dark. She could only tell that his upper garment felt like cotton and his shorts felt smooth and satin-like. The intruder fled through a window without grills leading to the adjoining unit. Renato "Chito" Baleros, Jr., a classmate whom she had rejected a week earlier after he told her "Gusto kita, mahal kita", had been let into the building at 1:30 a.m. to stay in the adjoining unit. The guard and the unit's occupant said he wore a white fraternity T-shirt and black Adidas shorts. His gray bag, which he left in another classmate's unit that morning, was found to contain a blue-stained handkerchief, the black Adidas shorts and the fraternity T-shirt. The PNP chemist found chloroform on the handkerchief and on the complainant's nightdress. Baleros denied the charge. He said he came from a fraternity party wearing a barong over a T-shirt and striped shorts lent to him there, and a defense expert showed that chloroform evaporates within 30 seconds. The RTC convicted him of attempted rape and imposed 4 years, 2 months and 1 day to 10 years, with damages and attorney's fees. The Court of Appeals affirmed.

1. 1Whether the circumstantial evidence sufficiently identified Baleros as the intruder.
2. 2Whether pressing a chemical-soaked cloth on the complainant's face while lying on top of her was an overt act of attempted rape.
3. 3If not, what offense the acts constitute.

Acquitted of attempted rape but convicted of light coercion (Garcia, J.). On identity, the Court agreed with the courts below. Positive identification may be by an eyewitness to the act itself, or by circumstantial evidence, as where the accused was the person last seen with the victim immediately before and after the crime. Under Rule 133, Section 4, the chain of circumstances here led to the fair and reasonable conclusion that Baleros was the intruder. He was in the building at the time and had access through the window. He wore clothes matching what the complainant felt. His bag held the chloroform-stained handkerchief and the clothes. But the acts proved were not attempted rape. Under Article 6, rape is attempted when the offender commences its commission directly by overt acts and does not perform all the acts of execution for a cause other than his own spontaneous desistance. Following People v. Lamahang, the attempt the Code punishes has a logical connection to a particular, concrete offense. Where the purpose of the act is uncertain and its relation to its objective ambiguous, it is an attempt to commit an indeterminate offense, which is not a juridical fact. An overt act is a physical deed, more than mere planning or preparation, that would logically and necessarily ripen into a concrete offense if carried to completion without external obstacle or voluntary desistance. It was too strained to treat pressing a chemical-soaked cloth on the complainant's mouth as an act that would necessarily ripen into rape. Baleros was fully clothed, did not try to undress her, and did not touch her private parts. Why he wanted her unconscious was anybody's guess. The Court of Appeals' reasoning that a rapist would undress only after subduing his victim was plain speculation, which cannot substitute for proof beyond reasonable doubt. Perez v. Court of Appeals and People v. Pancho were cited: attempted rape requires that the accused have commenced the act of penetration. The acts did, however, constitute unjust vexation, punished as light coercion under the second paragraph of Article 287. The information alleged that he forcefully covered her face with the chemical-soaked cloth, so he was informed of the acts charged. No allegation of malice, restraint or compulsion is needed for unjust vexation. The test is whether the act caused annoyance, irritation, torment, distress or disturbance to the mind of the person it was directed at, and the complainant's distress was evident. Baleros was sentenced to 30 days of arresto menor and a P200 fine.