BAKING vs. DIRECTOR OF PRISONS

BAKING vs. DIRECTOR OF PRISONS

G.R. No. L-30364 - July 28, 1969

FACTS:

Petitioners concededly had been under detention for more than eighteen (18) years under the charge of respondent Director of Prisons when, on May 16, 1969, the Supreme Court in its decision in People vs. Lava, et al., convicted petitioners for the crime of rebellion and sentenced each of them to ten (10) years’ imprisonment. This decision has since become final.

Previously, on March 31, 1969, petitioners Angel C. Baking and Simeon G. Rodriguez registered their petition for habeas corpus. They claimed that they had been denied the right to a speedy trial. On May 24, 1969, after the Supreme Court rendered its decision convicting petitioners of the crime of rebellion, Angel C. Baking and Simeon G. Rodriguez filed a motion for early decision of their petition for habeas corpus and for their immediate release, based primarily upon an averment similar to the other petitioner for habeas corpus before the Supreme Court, filed on June 17, 1969.

The present thrust of the two petitions is that petitioners should now be released because they have already served then ten (10) year sentences meted out to them.

ISSUE:

Whether or not Article 97 of the Revised Penal Code is applicable to detention prisoners.

RULING:

No.

It must be stated that inasmuch as the Revised Penal Code was originally approved and enacted in Spanish, the Spanish text governs. The term “any prisoner” in the Spanish text is “el penado,” who is a convict or a person already sentenced by final judgment. For, “el penado” means a “delincuente condenado a una pena.” There is thus no doubt that Article 97 does not embrace detention prisoners within its reach, because it speaks of the buena conducta observada por el penado – not one under “prisión preventiva.” The allowance for good conduct “for each month of good behavior” then unquestionably refers to good behavior of a prisoner while he is serving his term as a convict and not otherwise.

While Article 97 talks of “any prisoner” in the English text, it speaks, however, of that prisoner as being entitled to deductions for good conduct allowances “from the period of his sentence.” An accurate reading, therefore, of the provisions yields the plain implication that the prisoner concerned is one who already has a sentence clamped upon him, i.e., a definite sentence by final judgment. The term “any prisoner” should thus be limited to those convicted by final judgment. This is the import of the law as written.