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    People V Escleto

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    Lotsee Elauria
    - The defendant Filemon Escleto was charged with treason for allegedly assisting Japanese forces in arresting members of a guerrilla group, including Antonio Conducto, during the Japanese occupation in 1944. - Two witnesses, Sinforosa Mortero and Patricia Araya, testified that Escleto wrote down their names and escorted them and Conducto to a Japanese garrison, where Conducto was detained while the others were released. - The Supreme Court reversed Escleto's conviction, finding that the testimony of the two witnesses did not meet the strict requirements under Philippine law that each witness must testify to the whole overt act of treason or that there be two witnesses to each part of the overt act.

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    People V Escleto

    Uploaded by

    Lotsee Elauria
    1K views2 pages
    - The defendant Filemon Escleto was charged with treason for allegedly assisting Japanese forces in arresting members of a guerrilla group, including Antonio Conducto, during the Japanese occupation in 1944. - Two witnesses, Sinforosa Mortero and Patricia Araya, testified that Escleto wrote down their names and escorted them and Conducto to a Japanese garrison, where Conducto was detained while the others were released. - The Supreme Court reversed Escleto's conviction, finding that the testimony of the two witnesses did not meet the strict requirements under Philippine law that each witness must testify to the whole overt act of treason or that there be two witnesses to each part of the overt act.

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    people v escleto case digest

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    People v Escleto

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    - The defendant Filemon Escleto was charged with treason for allegedly assisting Japanese forces in arresting members of a guerrilla group, including Antonio Conducto, during the Japanese occupation in 1944. - Two witnesses, Sinforosa Mortero and Patricia Araya, testified that Escleto wrote down their names and escorted them and Conducto to a Japanese garrison, where Conducto was detained while the others were released. - The Supreme Court reversed Escleto's conviction, finding that the testimony of the two witnesses did not meet the strict requirements under Philippine law that each witness must testify to the whole overt act of treason or that there be two witnesses to each part of the overt act.

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Download as docx, pdf, or txt
    1K views2 pages

    People V Escleto

    Uploaded by

    Lotsee Elauria
    - The defendant Filemon Escleto was charged with treason for allegedly assisting Japanese forces in arresting members of a guerrilla group, including Antonio Conducto, during the Japanese occupation in 1944. - Two witnesses, Sinforosa Mortero and Patricia Araya, testified that Escleto wrote down their names and escorted them and Conducto to a Japanese garrison, where Conducto was detained while the others were released. - The Supreme Court reversed Escleto's conviction, finding that the testimony of the two witnesses did not meet the strict requirements under Philippine law that each witness must testify to the whole overt act of treason or that there be two witnesses to each part of the overt act.

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
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    Download as docx, pdf, or txt
    of 2

    G.R. No.

    L-1006 June 28, 1949


    THE PEOPLE OF THE PHILIPPINES, plaintiff-appellee, vs. FILEMON
    ESCLETO, defendant-appellant.
    FACTS
    The appellant, Filemon Escleto, was charged in the former People's Court with treason
    on three counts. The record shows that on or about, March 11, 1944, Japanese patrol
    composed of 17 men and 1 officer was ambushed and totally liquidated by guerrillas in
    barrio Bibito, Lopez, Province of Tayabas, now Quezon. As a result, some of inhabitants
    of Bibito and neighboring barrios, numbering several hundred, were arrested and others
    were ordered to report at the poblacion. Among the latter were Antonio Conducto, a
    guerrilla and former USAFFE, and his family. Sinforosa Mortero, 40, testified that on
    March 18, 1944, at about 5 PM, obedience to the Japanese order, she and the rest of
    her family went to the town from barrio Danlagan. Still in Danlagan, in front of Escleto's
    house, Escleto told them to stop and took down their names. With her were her
    daughter-in-law, her son Antonio Conducto, and three grandchildren. After writing their
    names, Escleto conducted them to the PC garrison in the poblacion where they were
    questioned by some whose name she did not know. This man asked her if she heard
    gunshots and she said yes but did not know where they were. The next day they were
    allowed to go home with many others, but her son was not released. Since then she
    had not seen him. On cross-examination she said that when Escleto took down their
    names her son asked the accused if anything would happen to him and his family, and
    Escleto answered, "Nothing will happen to you because I am to accompany you in going
    to town." Her daughter-in-law Patricia Araya declared that before reaching the town,
    Escleto stopped her, her mother-in-law, her husband, her three children, her brother-inlaw and the latter's wife and took down their names; that after taking their names
    Escleto and the PC soldier took them to the PC garrison; that her husband asked
    Escleto what would happen to him and his family, and Escleto said "nothing" and
    assured Conducto that he and his family would soon be allowed to go home; that
    Escleto presented them to a PC and she heard him tell the latter, "This is Antonio
    Conducto who has firearm;" that afterward they were sent upstairs and she did not know
    what happened to her husband.
    ISSUE
    W/N the two witnesses required to convict a defendant for treason may testify to
    separate parts comprising a whole overt act
    RULING Peoples Court
    The Peoples Court convicted the defendant for treason on 3 counts.
    RULING SC
    The SC REVERSED the decision of the Peoples Court. The only evidence against the
    appellant that might be considered direct and damaging is Patricia Araya's testimony
    that Escleto told a PC soldier, "This is Antonio Conducto who has firearm." But the
    prosecution did not elaborate on this testimony, nor was any other witness made to
    corroborate it although Patricia Araya was with her husband, parents and relatives who
    would have heard the statement if the defendant had uttered it. The authors of the twowitness provision in the American Constitution, from which the Philippine treason law
    was taken, purposely made it "severely restrictive" and conviction for treason difficult.

    The provision requires that each of the witnesses must testify to the whole overt act; or
    if it is separable, there must be two witnesses to each part of the overt act.

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