People v. Santiago

97 P.R. 509
CourtSupreme Court of Puerto Rico
DecidedJune 27, 1969
DocketNo. CR-68-179
StatusPublished

This text of 97 P.R. 509 (People v. Santiago) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Puerto Rico primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
People v. Santiago, 97 P.R. 509 (prsupreme 1969).

Opinion

Mr. Justice Ramírez Bages

delivered the opinion of the Court.

Appellant, Wilfredo Hernández Santiago, was accused and convicted of murder in the first degree. On January 5, 1967 he was sentenced to life imprisonment.

The 14 errors assigned by appellant are based on (1) the prosecuting attorney’s improper conduct; (2) the failure to admit the recording made by the defense of the testimony rendered by witnesses at the preliminary hearing; (3) the admission of evidence concerning appellant’s former offenses; (4) the denial of a motion to discharge the jury (mistrial); (5) errors in the instructions to the jury; (6) errors of the jury in weighing the evidence; (7) the denial of a new trial; and on (8) the fact that it does not appear from the record that the verdict was accepted by the trial court or that the sentence corresponded to the verdict.

[513]*513We do not agree, for the reasons, set forth hereinafter.

Summary of the Evidence

The following facts, recited by the Solicitor General, appear supported by the evidence.

■ “In or about the month of June 1965, in the Ward Bartolo of Lares, defendant had a wrangle with Manuel Soto, father' of the victim of the murder, Pablo Soto, in connection with the marking of boundaries which was being performed between Soto’s parcel and défendant’s property. [On that occasion defendant hit Soto with a machete wounding him on one arm.] About the month of August 1965, there was another controversy, this time between defendant and the victim of the murder, Pablo Soto, the former alleging that the latter had' insulted his wife. A trial was held against Pablo Soto in connection with this allegation, the latter being acquitted. Defendant told Pablo Soto, while coming out of the court, that ‘it was all right, that he was going to be acquitted, but that he would settle it.’ During the first' days of the month of r September 1965, defendant told witness Eugenio Vélez Lajara that he was going to give Pablo Soto a beating.

“Thursday, September 30, 1965, Pablo Soto left his house, at noon to take lunch to his brother Edelmiro Soto. That day Pablo Soto was wearing black rubber boots cut to the ankle. Witness Vélez Lajara saw Soto going towards the paved high-'way, a few minutes before twelve noon. Several witnesses saw defendant that day climbing alone in a jeep towards the ‘Arbona’ property at about 12 thirty in the afternoon. Witness Luis Angel Ramos Desardén noticed that defendant carried in the jeep a black bundle, some long sticks, and some black ‘parts of boots’ cut to the ankle. Another witness for the prosecution, Romualdo Caraballo, noticed that defendant carried an ash or black packsaddle and two sticks inside the jeep. This witness stated that the packsaddle was of the same color as that of the bundle where the victim of the murder was found. Defendant wore a shirt when he went up to the farm at noon. Around two to two thirty in the afternoon he was seen coming down in the jeep with Luis Morales. On this occasion defendant did not have a shirt on. Witness Vélez Lajara noticed that on that day [514]*514in the morning defendant wore dirty clothes, and that when he saw him again at two thirty in the afternoon he was clean.

“The following day, Friday, October 1, 1965, Ramón Ramos Desardén was working at the ‘Arbona’, a property owned by defendant’s father. At about two to two thirty in the afternoon he went to get ripe bananas in a footpath, when he noticed that defendant, naked from the waist up, carried a bundle upon his shoulder, and that ‘he threw it into a ditch that was there and covered it with pieces of sticks and banana plants.’ When defendant left the place, Ramos Desardén, who was hidden, went nearer the place where defendant had hidden the bundle and noticed that there was half of a human being, from the waist to the neck, wrapped and tied in an ash colored packsaddle. After he saw the bundle, the witness covered it and left it as defendant had placed it.

“On Saturday, October 2, 1965, during the morning, defendant ordered several of his employees to weed and fell coffee trees and banana plants near the place where the corpse of Pablo Soto appeared later. Luis Angel Ramos Desardén met defendant and the latter threatened him ‘because he had known that I had said that he carried a bundle.’ At two o’clock in the afternoon of that day, defendant went, accompanied by his employees, Carlos Vega Ferrer and Luis Morales, to find a tractor (‘puerca’) or machine to make roads to Tomás Molini’s house in the Ward Indiera Alta of Maricao. That same day defendant took the ‘puerca’ or tractor to the Arbona property and began to open a path ‘in the upper part where the corpse was found.’

“On Sunday, October 3, defendant arrived at the Ward Bartolo ‘with dirty clothes on, full of red dirt.’ The police, who were already investigating the disappearance of Pablo Soto, since October 1, suspected that defendant was working that Sunday and two policemen went to the Hacienda Arbona. There they found the tractor (‘puerca’) to make roads and noticed that defendant had made a path one kilometer long that day. The policemen wondered to see that in order to make that path ‘they had destroyed a coffee plantation quite beautiful where the coffee was about to ripen.’ At a place near where a curve had been cleared, there was a ditch in the lower part and ‘they had covered the ditch.’ Around five in the afternoon of that day, they found á stinking plastic ‘cellophane paper’ which was putrid. They placed a piece of wood over it and went to [515]*515find a bag to put it in, but when they returned, half an hour later, the paper had disappeared.

“On Tuesday, October 5, the police found several laborers to help to dig. They requested the authorization to dig from Andeliz Hernández, the defendant’s father, and he told them that they could dig there, that there were no problems. That day they dug until five in the afternoon. Defendant arrived there that day and asked them what were they doing there, and told them that if they dig there they had to leave the place as it was before.

“On Wednesday, October 6, in the morning, while the police continued the search, defendant went to the house of Palmira Santiago, the wife of one of the employees of defendant’s father, and told her that if the police asked about him to say ‘that it had been the Desardenes,’ that if the police asked her ‘about the crime which had occurred, that Pablo had been killed’, to say that ‘it had been done by the Desardenes.’

“The police continued the search during the rest of the week, and on Sunday, October 10, they borrowed a mechanical shovel. That Sunday a bundle with a heart and ribs, which stank very much, appeared wrapped in a packsaddle used to carry bananas and tied with a rope. While the police were digging, defendant was blocking the way and ‘obliged them to go up.’ They were able to go by the path when the loader came up and they requested defendant to open the path to run the machine over that day.

“On Monday, October 11, .the police went to the same place in the patrol car, and because of the rain, this vehicle ‘went into a ditch that had been formed and skidded and went to the other side and a tremendous stench came out.’ They noticed there lots of hair and bones and found a bag which contained a human head and two pieces of arms. The cover of defendant’s tractor (‘;puerca’) was near the edge of the path, in the place where they had begun to dig for the first time.

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97 P.R. 509, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/people-v-santiago-prsupreme-1969.