A local court found a police officer not guilty of the charges of robbery with intimidation of persons and graft charges that were earlier filed against him.
In a 19-page decision dated October 6, 2023, Judge Emmanuel Cacho Rasing of the city’s Regional Trial Court (RTC) Branch 3 found Police Lt. Col. Allan D. Docyogen not guilty of the aforesaid charges after the prosecution filed to present convincing evidence that would have warranted his conviction.
“It is the primordial duty of the prosecution to present its side with clarity and persuasion, so that conviction becomes the only logical and inevitable conclusion. What is required of it is to justify the conviction of the accused with moral certainty. Upon the prosecution’s failure to meet this test, acquittal becomes the constitutional duty of the court, lest its mind be tortured with the thought that it has imprisoned an innocent man for the rest of his life,” the decision stressed.
Docyogen was charged for robbery with intimidation of persons and graft for arresting the complaining witness by virtue of a warrant of arrest for an alleged offense, demanded and received money from the latter so that he will not arrest him again for other alleged similar warrants.
The said demand was allegedly coupled with threats that the police officer will kill the complainant if the latter will not give in to the demand.
With the presumption of innocence favoring the accused, the court examined the credibility of the complainant witness and that of his testimony specifically on the pay off. The alleged pay off assumes significance since as mentioned about the information alleged that the accused committed the aforesaid offenses charged by taking, receiving the complainant’s P50,000.
The court stated that the absence of clear evidence showing the existence of the blue paper mentioned by the complainant where he was allegedly made to insert the money rendered his narration doubtful. For if indeed he handed the money to the accused in the manner he wanted to portray, the blue paper containing the money should have been recovered by the seizing officer and captured in the photograph marked as an exhibit, especially that there appeared no significant gap between the giving of such money to the placing in the pocket of and its eventual recovery from the accused.
The decision coalited that the accused is a high ranking police officer and presumably a well-trained intelligence officer who surely knows how to elude immediate arrest if he was to commit a crime, thus, he would have not caught up with the complainant whom he just allegedly victimized with extortion as the latter went out of Daddy’s restaurant. As a seasoned intelligence officer, the accused would have immediately distanced himself from his victim, if indeed he extorted money from the latter, instead of catching up with him on his way out of the supposed crime scene. On this score, the court did not find the complainant’s testimony credible.
It is undeniable that money was recovered from the pocket of the accused. But the more plausible reason for the presence of such money in the pocket of the accused is the version of the latter that the complainant inserted the same in his pocket while saying pang operasyon yu sir, as he stood up and left the premises. The surprise felt by the accused from what the complainant did and said is consistent with his immediate reaction to catch up with the latter and blurt out as the latter was leaving,” the decision added.
The court claimed that it was not impressed with the credibility of the complainant since from the start of his testimony, he was never candid, consistent and straight forward. As soon as he started testifying, the complainant’s lack of forthrightness and consistency was evident. He claimed that a police officer whose assignment he initially refused to disclose, called to advise him that he better surrender because he had pending warrants of arrest. Later, he claimed that it was him who inquired from the police officer if he has a pending warrant because he had anticipated the issuance of one against him following his receipt of an unfavorable resolution from the Lucena city prosecutor. Because of his claim that he does not know the assignment of the police officer who informed him who is his alleged first cousin, he had to be told that he needed to tell the truth, thus, it turned out that after all, he was well aware of the assignment of the police officer involved.
The court asserted that it could not understand why the witness had to lie and conceal the unit assignment of Police Officer Bad-day when, in the first, he claimed that the latter was instrumental to his surrender and in fact accompanied him from the city hall canteen to the city intelligence unit with three other police officers.
According to the decision, the constitutional presumption of innocence of the accused is no less than a moral certainty of his guilt free of reasonable doubt. Moreover, the prosecution’s evidence must stand or fall on its own merits and cannot be allowed to draw strength from the weakness of the defense. The testimony of the complainant must be scrutinized with utmost caution, and unavoidably, his own credibility must also be put on trial.
The court added that the credibility of the evidence for the prosecution is not impressive. The inconsistencies and contradictions pointed out may be belittled as on the mere peripheral matters and the court may be willing to concede.
However, the unforthcoming conduct of the complainant in his attempts to lie on the matters pointed out provides no comfort.
The court could not rest easy if it were to place the faith and liberty of one man in the hands of a witness who had no qualms about lying even on matters which are insignificant, if in the first place, such is the proper characterization of the said observations.
“Honest mistakes in one’s testimony, occasioned by forgetfulness due to lapse of time and other well explained factors do not destroy but rather strengthen the credibility of a witness. But deliberate lies under oath, to the court, makes the witness unworthy of credence and guilt of the accused doubtful. To be clear, the court is not saying that it believes the claim of the accused that he was framed up. It should be categorically said, however, that because of the doubtful credibility of the prosecution’s evidence, the guilt of the accused has not been established beyond reasonable doubt,” the decision stipulated.
