G.R. No. 140088 - PEOPLE OF THE PHILIPPINES, VS. PHOEBE ASTUDILLO AND KU SHO PING, ACCUSED-.D E C I S I O N - Supreme Court E-Library

Ruling

Accordingly, Fajardo asked the informant to arrange a meeting between her (Fajardo) and Babes. [6] At about 11:30 oclock in the morning of May 17, 1998, Fajardo and the confidential agent met Babes, who turned out to be accused-appellant Phoebe Astudillo. After accused-appellant Astudillo had assured her of the first class quality of the shabu , Fajardo agreed to buy three kilos of shabu for P 2.1 million. For this purpose, they decided to meet on May 20, 1998, between 5 and 6 oclock in the afternoon, at the McDonalds Restaurant on Divisoria along C.M. Recto Avenue in order to consummate the sale. [7] Fajardo reported to Domantay and a buy-bust operation was planned. [8] They then organized a buy-bust team composed of seven police officers: P/Insp. Jean Fajardo (team leader), P/Insp. Efren Valmores, [9] SPO2 Reynaldo Palma, PO2 Elenito Apduhan, PO1 Jose Pedroza, PO1 Peter Sistemio, PO1 Rodrigo Bahug and the confidential agent. [10] On May 20, 1998, Fajardo and the confidential agent stayed in their office until the jump-off time (around 2:05 oclock in the afternoon), when she and her team went to the Western Police District (WPD) to coordinate with the other police officers. They proceeded to the McDonalds Restaurant in Divisoria, arriving there at around 5:40 oclock in the afternoon. [11] Fajardo and the informant proceeded to the second floor of McDonalds. PO1 Pedroza occupied a table facing them, about four meters away, while the rest of the team positioned themselves outside the restaurant. After a few minutes, accused-appellants Astudillo and Ku Sho Ping arrived. Astudillo asked Fajardo if she brought the money with her, to which the latter answered she had and pointed to a maroon attaché case beside her. The attaché case contained 700 pieces of genuine P 1,000.00 bills and newspaper cut boodle money arranged in three layers of seven bundles each. The bottom and second layers contained boodle money with one genuine P 1,000.00 bill on top of every bundle, while the first layer contained 99 pieces of P 1,000.00 bills divided into seven bundles. Ku Sho Ping requested to see the money, saying in her broken Tagalog, Ako tingin pera, kung ikaw talaga dala. (Ill look at the money, to see if youve really brought it with you.) Fajardo opened the attaché case for a short while and then closed it again. She did not let them touch the money as earlier agreed upon. Accused-appellants Ku Sho Ping and Astudillo then talked to each other in whispers, after which Ku Sho Ping went downstairs and told Fajardo to follow. After a few minutes, Fajardo, who was holding the attaché case, and Astudillo went downstairs, while the agent was left behind. They waited in front of the restaurant. Shortly after, Ku Sho Ping came back with a gold plastic ITTI bag. She opened the bag and Fajardo put her left hand inside the bag and felt its contents. Assured that the bag contained shabu , Fajardo turned over the attaché case containing the money to Astud