Republic of the Philippines
SUPREME COURT
Manila
EN BANC
G.R. No. L-3810 October 18, 1907
THE UNITED STATES, plaintiff-appellee,
vs.
DAMIAN ORERA (alias KIM CUAN), defendant-appellant.
Del-Pan, Ortigas and Fisher for appellant.
Attorney-General Araneta for appellee.
ARELLANO, C.J.:
Damian Orera (alias Kim Cuan) was convicted by the Court of First Instance of the city of Manila, of the crime charged in the complaint, namely, of having falsified, to the damages of a Chinese theatrical company of the Philippine Islands, called Eng Ning, "a Chinese theater ticket which entitled the bearer thereof to admission to a performance held in the theater of the above company at Manila, on the 7th of October, 1906, by counterfeiting and simulating the signature and rubric of Eng Ning on the ticket the same figures, letters, dragons, ornaments and signatures, as placed by Eng Ning and the above mentioned Chinese theatrical company . . ." The accused was sentenced to be imprisoned at the Insular Prison of Bilibid for the period of six months and one day, to pay a fine of 625 pesetas, Philippine currency, and the costs of the suit, from which the judgment the accused appealed.
The appeal having been heard, this court holds:
1. That, in effect, as argued by the appellant, he could not be convicted of the falsification of six tickets, as declared and held in the judgment appealed from, inasmuch as the complaint was restricted to one ticket only.lawphil.net
2. That the court below did not err in qualifying such ticket as a document in order to prosecute and punish the crime of falsification, the subject-matter of the complaint, because if, according to the authority cited by the appellant, a document is a "deed, instrument or other duly authorized paper by which something is proved, evidenced or set forth," and a private document is, according to another authority cited by the appellant, "every deed or instrument executed by a private person, without the intervention of a public notary or of other person legally authorized, by which document some disposition or agreement is proved, evidenced or set forth," it follows that the ticket in question, being an authorized document evidencing an agreement for the rent of a place in a theater to enable the possessor to witness a theatrical performance, is a private document.
The error has been in the penalty imposed, an error which necessarily must be remedied by this court in the present appeal, in order that the judgment may be in conformity with the law. Said penalty, according to the provisions of article 304 of the Penal Code, should be that of presidio correccional in its minimum and medium degrees, and a fine, plus the corresponding indemnification for the damage caused, which in the present case was P1, the price of the true ticket.
We, therefore, sentence Damian Orera (alias Kim Cuan) to one year, eleven months, and twenty one days of presidio correccional, and to pay a fine of 625 pesetas, as imposed in the judgment, with the accessory penalty provided for in article 58, the indemnification of P1 to the offended party, or, in default thereof, to subsidiary imprisonment, and the payment of the costs of both instances. So ordered.
Torres, Johnson, Willard and Tracey, JJ., concur.
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