First Division

GARCIA vs. SANDIGANABAYAN

GR No. 155574 – November 20, 2006

SUBJECT: Crimes committed by public officers – Section 3 (b) of Republic Act 3019 (Anti-
Graft and Corrupt Practices Act)

FACTS:
In criminal cases filed by the complainant Maria Lourdes Miranda, Timoteo Garcia, then
Regional Director of the Land Transportation Office Region X, together with Gilbert G. Nabo
and Nery Tagupa, employees of the same office, were charged for a violation of Section 3 (b) of
the Anti-Graft and Corrupt Practices Act for their alleged frequent borrowing of motor vehicles
from Oro Asian Automotive Center Corporation, which is engaged in the business of vehicle
assembly and dealership in Cagayan de Oro City, knowing that said corporation regularly
transacts with the accused’s LTO Office for the registration of its motor vehicles, in the reporting
of its engine and chassis numbers as well as the submission of its vehicle dealer’s report and
other similar transaction which require the prior approval and/or intervention of the said accused
Regional Director and employees and/or their said LTO office in Cagayan de Oro City, to the
damage and prejudice of and undue injury to said Oro Asian Automotive Corporation, including
complainant Maria Lourdes Miranda.

The evidence of the prosecution, as summarized by the Sandiganbayan, are as follows:

Estinasloa Yungao, employed as the driver and liaison officer of the Oro Asian
Automotive Center Corporation, an establishment engaged in the assembly of motor vehicles.
Yungao had to officially report to the LTO all the engine and chassis numbers prior to the
assembly of any motor vehicle. In the process, the Company had to secure from the LTO a
Conduct Permit after a motor vehicle has been completely assembled, for purposes of carrying
out the necessary road testing of the vehicle concerned. After the said road testing and prior to its
eventual sale/disposition, the vehicle has to be first properly registered with the LTO. Accused
Garcia, in his capacity as the Regional Director of the LTO of Cagayan de Oro City, was the
approving authority on the aforesaid reportorial requirements and the signatory of the said
Conduct Permits. Yungao would always personally talk to accused Garcia regarding the issuance
of the required Conduct Permit for any newly assembled vehicle. Yungao would secure from
accused Garcia as many as 30 to 40 of such permits in a year. Yungao maintained that accused
Garcia had been regularly borrowing motor vehicles from the Chiongs, the owners of the
Company. Accused Garcia confided to Yungao that he could not utilize the assigned government
vehicle for his own personal use during weekends. It was for this reason that he had to borrow
vehicle from the Chiongs to enable him to visit his farm. Yungao would be aware of the fact that
accused Garcia borrowed the vehicles requested because, for every such instance, a
corresponding delivery receipt is issued, which is place on top of his table for him to place in the
Company’s record files on the following working day.

On the other hand, Chiong testified that accused Garcia would ask his driver to get a vehivle on a
Saturday at around 6:30am. He would return it in the late afternoon of the same day. There was
only one instance when accused Garcia returned the motor vehicle on the day after, and this was
the time when the said vehicle had figured in a vehicular accident which resulted in the death of
a certain Jane, the daughter of Miranda.

In the Sandiganbayan, Garcia was convicted of 56 counts of violation of Section 3 (b) of

RA 3019. The accused Tagupa was acquitted while the case against accused Nabo, who remained
at large, were archived.

ISSUE: WON petitioner is guilty of violation of Section 3 (b) of RA 3019.

HELD: No!

In a criminal prosecution, it is necessary that every essential ingredient of the crime

charged must be proved beyond reasonable doubt in order to overcome the constitutional right of
the accused to be presumed innocent.

To be convicted of violation of Section 3 (b) of RA 3019, the prosecution has the burden
of proving the following elements:
(1) The offender is a public officer; (PO)
(2) Who requested or received a gift, a present, a share, a percentage, or a benefit;
(GPSPB)
(3) On behalf of the offender or any other person;
(4) In connection with a contract or transaction with the government; (CT) and
(5) In which the public officer, in an official capacity under the law, has the right to
intervene.

4th element not established. The requesting or receiving of any gift, present, share,
percentage, or benefit must be in connection with “a contract or transaction” wherein the public
officer in his official capacity had to intervene under the law. In the case at bar, the prosecution
did not specify what transaction the Company had with the LTO that petitioner intervened in
when he allegedly borrowed the vehicles from the company. It is not insufficient that petitioner
admitted that the Company has continually transacted with his office. What is required is that the
transaction involved should at least be described with particularity and proven. To establish the
existence of the 4th element, the relation of the fact requesting and/or receiving, and that of the
transaction involved must be clearly shown. The prosecution's allegation that the Company
regularly transacts with petitioner's LTO Office for the registration of its motor vehicles, in the
reporting of its engine and chassis numbers, as well as the submission of its vehicle dealer's
report, and other similar transactions, will not suffice. This general statement failed to show the
link between the 56 alleged borrowings with their corresponding transactions.

The crime of bribery as defined in Article 210 of the RPC consists of the following
elements:
(1) That the accused is a public officer;
(2) That he received directly or through another some gift or present, offer or promise;
(3) That such gift, present or promise has been given in consideration of his commission
of some crime, or any act not constituting a crime, or to refrain from doing something
which it is his official duty to do; and
(4) That the crime or act relates to the exercise of his functions as a public officer.
 There is utter lack of evidence adduced by the prosecution showing that petitioner
committed any of the three acts constituting direct bribery. The two prosecution witnesses did not
mention anything about petitioner asking for something is exchange for his performance of, or
abstaining to perform, an act in connection with his official duty. In fact, Aurora Chiong, VP and
GM of the Company, testified that the company complied with all the requirements of the LTO
without asking for any intervention from petitioner or from anybody else from said office.

Indirect bribery under Article 211 of the RPC is committed by a public officer who shall
accept gifts offered to him by reason of his office. The essential ingredient of this crime is that
the public officer concerned must have accepted the gift or material consideration. In the case at
bar, the prosecution was not able to show that petitioner indeed accepted a gift from the
Company. The alleged borrowing of a vehicle by petitioner from the company can be considered
as the gift in contemplation of the law. To prove that petitioner borrowed a vehicle from the
Company 56 times, the prosecution adduced in evidence 56 delivery receipts allegedly signed by
petitioner’s representative whom the latter would send to pick up the vehicle.

The SC find that the delivery receipts do not sufficiently prove that petitioner received the
vehicles considering that his signatures do not appear therein. In addition, the prosecution failed
to establish that it was petitioner's representatives who picked up the vehicles. The acquittal of
one of the accused

(Nery Tagupa) who allegedly received the vehicles from the Company further strengthens this
argument. If the identity of the person who allegedly picked up the vehicle on behalf of the
petitioner is uncertain, there can also be no certainty that it was petitioner who received the
vehicles in the end.

The conclusion of the Sandiganbayan is grounded entirely on speculation, surmise and

conjectures; the inference made is manifestly an error or founded on a mistake; there is grave
abuse of discretion; the judgment is based on misapprehension of facts; and the findings of fact
are premised on a want of evidence and are contradicted by evidence on record. The SC is
constrained to apply the exception rather than the rule. They find that the ruling of the
Sandiganbyan that petitioners actually received the vehicles through his representatives is
grounded entirely on speculation, surmise and conjectures, and not supported by evidence on
record. The certainty of petitioner’s receipt of the vehicle for his alleged personal use was not
substantiated.

The Sandiganbayan’s decision is reversed and set aside. ACQUITTED.