People v Lising

Facts:

Rodolfo Manalili, a businessman, asked Felimon Garcia, his townmate, if he knew somebody
who could allegedly effect the arrest of Robert Herrera, the suspect in the killing of his brother,
Delfin Manalili

- Garcia then called up manalili and informed him that he already contracted a policeman to help
him. Garcia introduced Roberto Lising, Enrico Dizon, and another man armed with a service
pistol to Manalili.

- During the meeting, Manalili offered to pay them 50,000 pesos for the job. Lising’s group then
met with Vic Lisboa, an employee of Manalili, who will point them the person to be arrested.
They conducted a surveillance on the Castanas residence in the hope seeing herrera.

- The group saw a man a woman, who happened to be Cochise Bernabe and Beebom
Castanas, leave the castanas residence and they followed them. When the car of the couple
stopped, they alighted from the car and were immediately accosted by Dizon and Manga who
were both carrying firearms. Their obduction hit the front pages of the newspaper.

- After 2 months, two security guard told the CAPCOM that their friends Raul Morales and Jun
Medrano, both employees of Roberto Lising, informed them that Lising killed a man and a
woman in their warehouse.

- The body of Cochise and Beebom was then found and exhumed from a shallow grave. One by
one, the men responsible for the killing of Cochise and Beebom feel into the hands of the
authorities. Manalili, Lising Garcia, Manga, and Dizonn was convicted by the RTC of the crime
of double murder qualified with treachery, and aggravated by premeditation and abuse of public
position by Lising, Manga and Dizon. Lising, Dizon and Manga were also convicted of the crime
of slight illegal detention aggravated by use of a motor vehicle.

Issue: Whether Garcia performed the acts admitted by him the compulsion of the irresistible
force and/or under the impulse of an uncontrollable fear of an equal or greater injury and
therefore exempt them for criminal liability.

Held: No. To be exempt from criminal liability, a person invoking irresistible force or
uncontrollable fear must show that the force exerted was such that it reduced him to a mere
instrument who acted not only without will but against his will. That compulsion must be some of
character as to leave the accused no opportunity of self-defense in equal combat for escape.
Garcio’s participation and presence from the time of abduction was hatched, up to the killing of
the victim is undisputed. He was very well of Manalili’s plans. He was instrumental in introducing
lising to Manalili, Likewise, Lising’s intentions to silence both cochise and beebom at the end
upon realizing an alleged mistake was known to Garcia. He did not do anything to deter the
commission or to report the crimes immediately. In fact, he stabbed that he and lising saw each
other after the incident but never mentioned anything about it, which only goes to show their
intention concealing the crime.