GR No.

L-37271 July 1, 1933

THE PEOPLE OF THE PHILIPPINE ISLANDS, plaintiff-appellee,

vs.
MAGDALENA CALISO, defendant-appellant.

Juan Sumulong for appellant.

Attorney-General Jaranilla for appellee.

ABAD SANTOS, J .:

The appellant in this case was convicted of the crime of murder by the Court of First Instance of
Occidental Negros, and sentenced to suffer the penalty of reclusion perpetua , to indemnify the parents
of the deceased in the sum of P1,000, with the accessory penalties prescribed by law, and to pay the
costs. On this appeal, her counsel de officio attacks the findings of fact of the trial court, but does not
raise any question of law.

The questions of fact involved in this case are fully discussed in well considered decision of the trial
court, presided over by then Judge Quirico Abeto, which decision reads as follows:

Magdalena Caliso is accused of the crime of murder of a 9-month-old boy, in La Carlota, Negros
Occidental, on February 8 of this year, 1932. The complaint alleges that the accused, being a servant of
the Messrs. Emerald (Emilio), voluntarily, illegally and criminally and with the purpose of satisfying a
vengeance, I administer a certain amount of concentrated acetic acid, which is a poisonous substance,
to Emilio Esmeralda, Jr., a 9-month-old boy, causing him burns in the mouth, throat, intestines and other
vital parts of the internal organs that necessarily caused the death of the victim, who succumbed a few
hours later; that in the commission of this crime, the aggravating circumstances of alevosia have
concurred,

After presenting the evidence, both of the accusation, as well as of the defense, and after hearing the
brilliant reports adduced both by the Provincial Prosecutor and by the ex officio lawyerof the accused,
the Court has reserved the decision for this day, but not before congratulating both the accusation and
the defense, the first for the conscientious in the meeting and presentation of their evidence, and the
second for the great interest with which has shown in favor of the accused. The Court has wanted to
take time to decide this cause, because it realizes how serious the crime is and the circumstances of
both the accused and those offended in this case. On the one hand, there is the accused, who is a
woman who belongs to the weak sex, in the spring of her life, whom a sentence could deprive of all the
benefits that life offers her. On the other hand, a mother mad with pain who has lost the only male son
of the family and who considers the cause as the person who has taken her only love.

And of the evidence presented, the Court finds that on the afternoon of February 8, 1932, while the
spouses. Messrs. Emilio Esmeralda and Flora Gonzalez were sleeping taking a nap, suddenly Mrs.
Esmeralda woke up because she heard a sharp cry from her son Emilio Esmeralda, 9 months old, who
was sleeping in a bed opposite the site where She was sleeping with her husband. When Mrs. Esmeralda
arrived, followed by her husband, to the bed where she had left her son asleep, when she lifted the bed
net, she immediately perceived a strong smell of acetic acid and found her son, who was still crying
loudly , with blank eyes, swollen and whitish lips and bruised face, and when raised, he perceived the
smell of acetic acid in the child's breathing. Then she shouted asking who had put acetic acid in her son's
mouth, and since she is a pharmacist by profession, she immediately remembered an antidote that
could neutralize the effects of acetic acid and she herself took out lime water and wetting a hydrophilic
cotton, clean the child's mouth, while sending her husband to call the doctor. A few moments later Dr.
Augusto Locsin arrived, who according to his statement, immediately noticed the smell of acetic acid in
the child's breathing, and wanted to make the first cure, washing the child's stomach, but the mother
did not want the washing to come to the stomach, for fear of hurting the throat of the child with the
'catheter', and for this reason the washing could only be done to the throat of the child. After some
time, they arrived, from Bacolod, Drs. Orosa and Ochoa, who by phone had also been called by the
victim's father. Dr. Orosa is the chief medical officer of the Provincial Hospital of this province, and Dr.
Ochoa is one of the doctors residing in that hospital, a specialist in diseases of the five senses. Both
doctors stated positively that they had perceived the smell of acetic acid in the child's breathing, and
having concluded that the boy had taken acetic acid, applied the cure to remove said substance from
the child's organism, and after making the first cures, They took the child to the Provincial Hospital and
died there a few minutes after arriving. Orosa is the chief medical officer of the Provincial Hospital of
this province, and Dr. Ochoa is one of the doctors residing in that hospital, a specialist in diseases of the
five senses. Both doctors stated positively that they had perceived the smell of acetic acid in the child's
breathing, and having concluded that the boy had taken acetic acid, applied the cure to remove said
substance from the child's organism, and after making the first cures, They took the child to the
Provincial Hospital and died there a few minutes after arriving. Orosa is the chief medical officer of the
Provincial Hospital of this province, and Dr. Ochoa is one of the doctors residing in that hospital, a
specialist in diseases of the five senses. Both doctors stated positively that they had perceived the smell
of acetic acid in the child's breathing, and having concluded that the boy had taken acetic acid, applied
the cure to remove said substance from the child's organism, and after making the first cures, They took
the child to the Provincial Hospital and died there a few minutes after arriving.

Both doctors, as well as Dr. Locsin, are unanimous in the claim that the boy's death was due to poisoning
by acetic acid, and everyone, especially Dr. Ochoa, agrees in the opinion that death has been due to
suffocation, because acetic acid has wreaked havoc on the child's larynx and he could not breathe. Dr.
Ochoa, who, as said, is a specialist in all five senses, examined the child's mouth and throat and found
burns caused, according to him, by acetic acid. And so sure are the doctors that the child had taken
acetic acid and that the death of it was due to this substance, that Dr. Orosa himself, who is a very long-
standing doctor and an expert surgeon, I assure the Prosecutor that there was no need for an autopsy to
reach a conclusion on the safety of the cause of the chiquillio's death, and that even when the autopsy
showed that there was no acetic acid in the intestines of, child, because this had been absorbed by the
organism, or because the stomach had been washed, he was sure that death was due to acetic acid
poisoning, because he had smelled that substance, whose smell is unmistakable, in the child's breathing
and has seen the ravages of the substance in the throat and mouth of the deceased. Both doctors, in a
positive way, without hesitation, assured the Court that the cause of death, as has been repeated
several times, is due to acetic acid poisoning. And the Court agrees that in such circumstances,

The Court has no doubt of the competence of these two doctors, especially in the opinion of Dr. Ochoa,
who is a specialist in the five senses and has recognized the throat and mouth of the child, in which he
found burns induced by acetic acid.

Apart from this, the mother of the deceased, who is a pharmacist, accustomed to smell and distinguish
substances, perceived the smell of acetic acid in the first moments in which she raised her son from the
bed. This lady's husband, Mr. Emilio Esmeralda, is also a chemist and I also assure that I have smelled
the strong smell of acetic acid from the first moments. Apart from these two people who may be
mistaken, whether for their passion or for the concerns at the moment of being interested in their son,
is Mr. Julian Gomeri, another chemist who lived in the same house, who assured the Court that when
entering the room where the boy was in his mother's arms, immediately smelled the suffocating smell
of acetic acid,

That is why the Court repeats that it is proven beyond all rational doubt that the child Emilio Esmeralda,
Jr., died as a result of acetic acid poisoning, and it is unsustainable the theory that I publish having had
an indigestion for having ingested orange juice from California after drinking milk, and that the smell of
acetic acid could be derived from the vomiting of the kid by mixing it with orange juice and milk. Three
doctors and three chemicals are impossible to confuse the smell of orange juice that has become acidic
when mixed with milk, with the strong smell of concentrated acetic acid.

Having reached this conclusion that the death of the child Emilio Esmeralda, Jr., was due to acetic acid
poisoning, the other issue that the Court has to solve is: who administered this substance.

From this point the tests are all circumstantial only.

It is a proven fact that days before this event, when Mr. Emilio Esmeralda returned to his house, from
the factory of the Central La Carlota, at about dawn, not a certain lump that moved in the bottom of his
bed in the room-room of him and his lady when she spent a few days in La Carlota. Fearing that some
thief had entered under the bed, he picked up his gun and threatened to shoot him who was there if he
did not leave. Indeed, a man came out of there and, all trembling, he told Mr. Esmeralda that he was not
a thief, but that he was there because he had been called by the accused with whom he was in love. Mr.
Esmeralda then recriminated him for his act and let him go, telling him not to repeat the act
again. When mrs. Flora Gonzalez arrived in La Carlota a few days later, that is, on the day of the car, Mr.
Esmeralda, after breakfast and then being absent the accused for having gone to the market, he told his
wife what had happened in one of the past few days, that is, having surprised a man in his own room
and under his bed, attending an appointment he had with the accused. Mrs. Esmeralda, given her
education and being a woman at last, felt very offended and outraged by the act of her maid and, very
nervous, I await the return of the accused, and when she arrived, Mrs. Esmeralda I search in the kitchen,
he began to insult her from head to toe, recriminating her for her immoral act and for allowing herself
to hide her lover in her master's own room, and after scolding the accused, she returned to her
room, and the recrimination that he had just done to the defendant seemed little to him, Mrs.
Esmeralda again returned to the kitchen to reprimand her again, and as Mrs. Esmeralda's nerves did not
calm down on these two occasions, as He returned to the kitchen, undertook new insults to the accused,
in terms that when Mrs. Esmeralda put her son to sleep in the bed, when she found something dirty the
pillow covers, again she went to the kitchen and returned to admonish the accused by recriminating her
and saying that she only knew how to have lovers and did not know how to fulfill her duties as a
maid. Hardly two hours scarce to occur these insults, the event occurred that gave rise to the death of
the boy Emilio Esmeralda, Jr. and as Mrs. Esmeralda's nerves did not calm down on these two occasions,
as she returned to the kitchen, she made new insults to the accused, in terms that when Mrs. Esmeralda
put her son to sleep in the When he found something dirty on the pillow covers, he went to the kitchen
again and reprimanded the accused recriminating her and saying that she only knew how to have lovers
and did not know how to fulfill her duties as a maid. Hardly two hours scarce to occur these insults, the
event occurred that gave rise to the death of the boy Emilio Esmeralda, Jr. and as Mrs. Esmeralda's
nerves did not calm down on these two occasions, as she returned to the kitchen, she made new insults
to the accused, in terms that when Mrs. Esmeralda put her son to sleep in the When he found
something dirty on the pillow covers, he went to the kitchen again and reprimanded the accused
recriminating her and saying that she only knew how to have lovers and did not know how to fulfill her
duties as a maid. Hardly two hours scarce to occur these insults, the event occurred that gave rise to the
death of the boy Emilio Esmeralda, Jr. When he found something dirty on the pillow covers, he went to
the kitchen again and reprimanded the accused recriminating her and saying that she only knew how to
have lovers and did not know how to fulfill her duties as a maid. Hardly two hours scarce to occur these
insults, the event occurred that gave rise to the death of the boy Emilio Esmeralda, Jr. When he found
something dirty on the pillow covers, he went to the kitchen again and reprimanded the accused
recriminating her and saying that she only knew how to have lovers and did not know how to fulfill her
duties as a maid. Hardly two hours scarce to occur these insults, the event occurred that gave rise to the
death of the boy Emilio Esmeralda, Jr.

Proceeding by elimination, the Prosecutor's Office has tried to prove to the Court, and thus alleges in its
report, that at the time of the incident of the child's poisoning, only ten people were living in the house
where the event occurred, , namely: the Esmeralda spouses, their two daughters, Lilia and Elsa, the boy
Emilio Esmeralda, Jr., Julai Gomeri, Jose Colmenares, Catalino Ramos, a maid about 12 years old, named
Magdalena Soriano, and the one accused here . The Prosecutor says they cannot be the perpetrators of
the poisoning, neither Mr. Esmeralda, nor his wife. The Court, of course, agrees with this elimination. It
is not possible that these are the authors of such poisoning; In addition to being parents, the mother's
attitude, mad with pain at the death of her son, removes all doubt. It would be absurd the most remote
assumption that these people were the authors of such poisoning. It could not be Elsa Esmeralda
because this, apart from her few years, was sleeping with her little brother in the same bed where the
incident occurred. It could not be Lilia, nor the maid Magdalena Soriano, because both were then in the
toilet, according to the evidence; also that the assumption could not fit that, or Magdalena Soriano, or
Lilia mistakenly administered acetic acid to the sleeping child, because the bottle that contained it was
in the kitchen, according to the accused herself, near the water jug where she She had put, and the
accused, according to herself, was in the kitchen all afternoon washing dishes, so that if Magdalena
Soriano or Lilia had wanted to reach the bottle of acetic acid, The accused would have seen them. Julian
Gomeri was asleep in his room; He was a companion of Mr. Esmeralda at work, an unfriendly friend of
the family and has had no dislike with any member of her and there is no reason to attribute that he has
put acetic acid in the child's mouth. Jose Colmenares was in the plant of the Central, which is half a
kilometer from the house occupied by Messrs. Esmeralda, occupied in his work as an employee of said
Central. Catalino Ramos was absent then in the town, because he was in the town of Talisay. Once these
people have been eliminated, only the accused remains as the possible author of the act of
administering acetic acid to the child Emilio Esmeralda, Jr. Intomo friend of the family and has not had
any disgust with any member of her and there is no reason to attribute that he has put in the mouth of
the child acetic acid. Jose Colmenares was in the plant of the Central, which is half a kilometer from the
house occupied by Messrs. Esmeralda, occupied in his work as an employee of said Central. Catalino
Ramos was absent then in the town, because he was in the town of Talisay. Once these people have
been eliminated, only the accused remains as the possible author of the act of administering acetic acid
to the child Emilio Esmeralda, Jr. Intomo friend of the family and has not had any disgust with any
member of her and there is no reason to attribute that he has put in the mouth of the child acetic
acid. Jose Colmenares was in the plant of the Central, which is half a kilometer from the house occupied
by Messrs. Esmeralda, occupied in his work as an employee of said Central. Catalino Ramos was absent
then in the town, because he was in the town of Talisay. Once these people have been eliminated, only
the accused remains as the possible author of the act of administering acetic acid to the child Emilio
Esmeralda, Jr. occupied in his work as an employee of said Central. Catalino Ramos was absent then in
the town, because he was in the town of Talisay. Once these people have been eliminated, only the
accused remains as the possible author of the act of administering acetic acid to the child Emilio
Esmeralda, Jr. occupied in his work as an employee of said Central. Catalino Ramos was absent then in
the town, because he was in the town of Talisay. Once these people have been eliminated, only the
accused remains as the possible author of the act of administering acetic acid to the child Emilio
Esmeralda, Jr.

Of course, the evidence that the accused, a few hours before the event, was the only one in the house
who had received insults from the child's mother, is circumstantial evidence against her. None had
grounds for resentment towards any member of the deceased's family other than the accused. She
herself admitted during her testimony that on that day she had been rebuked by her mistress. When the
boy Emilio Esmeralda, Jr., gave a high-pitched scream that woke his mother, Julian Gomeri, who was
asleep in the other room, he could open his eyes and saw the accused coming out of the living room
door and heading towards the kitchen. This room had to go out of the room where the child was asleep,
to go to the kitchen; and the distance from the door of this room to the place where the child was
sleeping was only 4 or 5 meters. The defendant has not been able to deny this statement by Julian
Gomeri, nor has she been able to give any explanation because at that moment she was leaving the
room to go to the kitchen. It is possible that after having put the acetic acid in the child's mouth, he
could not scream immediately, but a few seconds later when he felt the effects of the acid, so that the
accused had time to leave the site and return to the cooking and being in the room, the boy gave the
first shout that made Julian Gomeri open his eyes. This fact is another quite strong circumstantial
evidence, according to the Court, against the accused. When the child's mother was healing him, he
ordered the accused and Magdalena Soriano to boil water in the kitchen, and while these two maids
fulfilled the order, the defendant, without any plausible reason, He put his hands under Magdalena
Soriano's nose and said: "My hands are smelling acetic acid because something has been spilled there
when I made vinegar this morning with acetic acid." This unsolicited explanation made by the accused
does not seem to indicate anything other than some fear she had in case someone could smell acetic
acid on her hands. Another circumstantial evidence against the accused is the fact that in the house she
was the only one who had in her custody this Exhibit A bottle that contained acetic acid. Magdalena
Soriano did not even know where this bottle was placed. When Mrs. Esmeralda looked for this bottle,
whose memory she remembered by smelling the acetic acid in her son's mouth, the accused was the
one who took the bottle from the kitchen and handed it to Mrs. Esmeralda, saying it ,

The defendant, when declaring in the testimony chair as a witness in his favor, when asked by the Court
if he has smelled acetic acid when entering the room, did so much; but he immediately replaced himself
and strongly denied having smelled acetic acid. The Court addressed this question several times, and the
accused insisted on her refusal. The Court asked him if he knew the acetic acid and the smell of it, and
affirmed that he did and returned to affirm that he had not perceived such a smell in the room upon
entering and for as long as he had remained there. Now, three impartial doctors, chemists and a
pharmacist, apart from Magdalena Soriano, have smelled the unmistakable smell of acetic acid in the
room. The only one who has not been able to smell this substance is the accused. In the commission of a
crime, the only one who has an interest in denying the existence of a body of crime is almost always, or
almost without, the author of it. And this attitude of the accused of denying such an obvious thing and
about which the Court has no doubt, corroborates, in the judgment of the Court, all the circumstantial
evidence that has been presented by the accusation.

The defense emphasizes the fact that the accused, far from escaping, entered the room to help the
child's mother to save this, and so much so that the same accused, according to Julian Gomeri, as soon
as Ms. Esmeralda asked for cotton, it was the one that took the cotton from Julian Gomeri and handed it
to Mrs. Esmeralda. This fact is not, in the opinion of the Court, sufficient to prove the innocence of the
accused. How many times has it happened that he who has performed a criminal act repents his crime
and tries to remedy it! The one who has just hurt a man, after the first moment of obcecation has
passed, if he could heal him, he would undoubtedly not find a better doctor for the injured. It can also
happen that the accused, having wanted to cause damage only to the creature, He wanted to use all his
ability so that the effects of the damage were not so great. The defendant's attitude, therefore, is
perfectly explainable and not incompatible with her guilt. Another attitude of the accused that seems to
have a lot of weight is her attitude when she returned in the afternoon of the day after the event at the
police station when the Chief of Police told her to return in that afternoon. And the defendant's lawyer
is right to emphasize this circumstance. The defendant has been arrested almost midnight the same day
as the event. She was released at 11 a.m. the next day, given that no arrest warrant was coming against
her; but the Chief of Police told him to return at 3 o'clock in the afternoon, and at 3 o'clock that
afternoon the defendant returned to the municipal building. The defendant's lawyer argues that a
criminal conscience would not proceed as the defendant has proceeded; She would have escaped. The
Court has carefully considered this aspect of the matter; he has meditated long on this act of the
accused; but the conclusion of the Court is that if the defendant returned in the afternoon of that day to
the municipal building, it was because the defendant did not know that the child Emilio Esmeralda, Jr.,
had died. In addition, she should know that, woman she was, she could not go anywhere without being
reached by the corresponding authorities and, therefore, it was better for her to appear before the
authorities pretending to have a calm conscience and preparing her future defense in that way. .

It may be said that it is not usual that, having the mother of the child offended by the accused, this,
instead of taking revenge of the mother, that many opportunities she would have had because, as the
defense lawyer has tried to highlight, the accused slept in the same room of the Esmeralda husbands
and prepared their food, directed her avenging action to an innocent creature, especially considering
that the accused is a woman and women, as a rule, are more charitable than the men. In the first place,
be it a man, be it a woman, when they are obscured by hatred and revenge, they no longer consider the
circumstances and seek to direct their revenge to those who have offended them there where it is
easier to execute. In this case, the boy Emilio Esmeralda, Jr., He was the one who slept closest to the
door entering immediately, coming from the kitchen, and he was the one who, by his tender age, could
immediately feel the effects of acetic acid, thus being able to execute his revenge with greater certainty
on his part. Causing damage to the child, who, being the only male in the family, was the most beloved
by Messrs. Esmeralda, caused greater damage to Mrs. Esmeralda. The Court, of course, accepts the
theory that women are much more charitable than men and much weaker than common consensus; but
precisely because she is more charitable, because she is weaker, when the woman becomes bad and
wants revenge, her revenge seeks the weakest too and on this makes that revenge fall, and daily
experience teaches us that the weakest beings, be men or women, when they become bad, they are
worse enemies; and it is not strange, therefore, that the accused, fearing to attack Mr. Esmeralda and
Mrs. Esmeralda, because against them he was not assured of the execution of his revenge, has chosen
as a victim a defenseless creature of 9 months age.

Based on the above considerations, the Court finds it beyond reasonable doubt that 9-month-old Emilio
Esmeralda, Jr. died on February 8, 1932, as a result of concentrated acetic acid poisoning, and that the
accused, Taking advantage of the occasion in which their masters were sleeping, I administer a small
amount of this substance to said child, thus burning his mouth and throat, as a result of which said child
died.

Therefore, the accused Magdalena Caliso is found guilty of the crime of murder, and considering in the
commission of the crime the concurrence of the aggravating circumstance of alevosia, because it is a
defenseless being, and the circumstance of having performed the act in the own residence of the
victim's parents, whose circumstances are compensated with the mitigating circumstances of lack of
instruction and having acted on the basis of impulses of a feeling that has caused her outburst and
obsession, condemns her to the penalty of life imprisonment , to compensate the parents of the
deceased in the sum of P1,000, with the accessory of the law, and to pay the costs of the trial. That's
how it is ordered.

We agree to the conclusions of fact reached by the trial court. As to the application of the law to the
facts of the case, we are inclined to the proposition advanced by the Attorney-General that in the
commission of the crime the aggravating circumstance of grave abuse of confidence was present since
the appellant was the domestic servant of the family and was sometimes the deceased child's
amah. The circumstance of the crime having been committed in the dwelling of the offended party,
considered by the lower court as another aggravating circumstance, should be disregarded as both the
victim and the appellant were living in the same house. (US vs. Rodriguez, 9 Phil., 136; US vs.. Destrito
and De Ocampo, 23 Phil., 28.) Likewise, threachery cannot be considered to aggravate the penalty as it is
inherent in the offense of murder by means of poisoning (3 Viada, p. 29). Similarly the finding of the trial
court that the appellant acted under an impulse so powerful as naturally to have produced passion and
obfuscation should be discarded because the accused, in poisoning the child, was actuated more by a
spirit of lawlessness and revenge than by any sudden impulse of natural and uncontrollable fury
(People vs. Hernandez, 43 Phil., 104, 111) and because such sudden burst of passion was not provoked
by prior unjust or improper acts of the victim or of his parents (US vs. Taylor, 6 Phil., 162), since Flora
Gonzalez had the perfect right to reprimand the defendant for indecently converting the family's
bedroom into a rendezvous of herself and her lover.

The aggravating circumstance of abuse of confidence being offset by the extenuating circumstance of
defendant's lack of instruction considered by the lower court, the medium degree of the prescribed
penalty should, therefore, be imposed, which, in this case, is perpetual reclusion .

The penalty imposed by the lower court upon the appellant being thus within the limits fixed by law, the
judgment appealed from is affirmed with costs. So ordered.