G.R. No. 119014 - PEOPLE OF THE PHILIPPINES, VS. JOJO PEREZ Y PAMORCA, ALIAS “JOSEPH,” LUIS BERJA Y VERSOSA AND AVELINO BARASONA Y CUNDAT, ACCUSED. LUIS BERJA Y VERSOSA AND AVELINO BARASONA Y CUNDAT, ACCUSED-.

Ruling

WHEREFORE, the Court hereby finds the accused, Jojo Perez y Pamorca, alias "Joseph", Luis Berja y Versoza and Avelino Barasona y Cundat, guilty beyond reasonable doubt of the crime of murder as defined and penalized under Art. 248 of the Revised Penal Code and are hereby sentenced to reclusion perpetua. Accused are hereby ordered to pay the heir or heirs of the victim the amount of P100,000.00 by way of indemnity and to pay the further sum of P9,000.00 to Teresita Janapin, the victims sister, representing the actual expenses incurred by her for the wake and burial of the deceased. Cost against the accused. [2] In the trial of this case which was successively conducted by two trial judges, [3] Conchita Zulueta recounted that she was walking along Capri Street in San Francisco Village in Taytay, Rizal at around five oclock in the afternoon of June 23, 1991 when she witnessed a gruesome incident. As she was about to cross paths with a group of four men walking alongside one another on the opposite side of the road, later identified as the three accused and the victim, two of them, Luis Berja and Avelino Barasona, suddenly held the arms of Eduardo Jimena, who was then walking between them. Accused Jojo Perez thereupon assaulted Jimena with a weapon wrapped in a newspaper by delivering three hacking blows on the hapless victim. When the latter fell down, Berja and Barasona scampered away, with Avelino Barasona almost bumping the supposed eyewitness, Conchita Zulueta. [4] Zulueta, who claims she was only four meters away from the men, went on to assert that she and Jojo Perez were left behind and that the latter then proceeded to deliberately slash the neck of Jimena with his bolo which was then no longer covered by its newspaper wrapper. This caused her to exclaim "Inay!" , which reaction on her part solicited an angry retort of "May angal ka?" from Perez. At that instant, Zulueta recovered her wits and she then dashed for safety. She kept to herself for the next five days staying all the while in her house and, although she says she was a close friend of the family of Eduardo Jimena, she did not, allegedly on account of fear, bother to inform them until after that period that she had witnessed Jimenas gory demise. [5] The version of the accused is different. According to Luis Berja and Avelino Barasona, they were invited in the late afternoon of that day by their neighbor, Eduardo Jimena, to swim in a pool located in Florence Street, Taytay, Rizal. However, they found out on their arrival at the swimming pool that it was closed, so the trio decided to head back home. They were walking along Capri Street when two strangers, one of them shouting, "Matagal ka na naming hinahanap!," all of a sudden attacked them. One of the attackers, who was the shorter of the two, hacked Barasona on the hand, causing the latter to run for safety together with Luis Berja. The taller assailant, armed with a bolo, vented his fury on Eduardo Jimena who failed to escape.