G.R. No. 135119; October 21, 2004
PRESIDENTIAL COMMISSION ON GOOD GOVERNMENT (Represented by DANILO R.V. DANIEL), petitioner, vs. THE HONORABLE OMBUDSMAN ANIANO A. DESIERTO, ALICIA LL. REYES, DON M. FERRY, PLACIDO MAPA, MR. AND MRS. PEDRO GARCIA, SR., and SANTIAGO DUMLAO, JR., respondents.

FACTS

The Presidential Ad Hoc Committee on Behest Loans, chaired by the PCGG, investigated loan transactions between Selectra Electronics Corporation (SELEC) and the Development Bank of the Philippines (DBP). The Committee found that between 1976 and 1980, SELEC, through its officers (private respondents Garcia spouses and Santiago Dumlao, Jr.), obtained substantial foreign currency and peso loans approved by the DBP Board (public respondents Reyes, Ferry, and Mapa). The Committee concluded these were behest loans, characterized by SELEC’s insufficient capital and collateral and the project’s non-feasibility.
Consequently, on September 15, 1997, the Committee filed a criminal complaint with the Office of the Ombudsman for violation of the Anti-Graft and Corrupt Practices Act (R.A. No. 3019). The Ombudsman dismissed the complaint, ruling the offense had prescribed. It held that since the loan transactions occurred from 1976 to 1980 and the complaint was filed in 1997, more than the ten-year prescriptive period (as increased to fifteen years by B.P. Blg. 195) had lapsed, commencing from the date of the commission of the offense.

ISSUE

Did the Ombudsman commit grave abuse of discretion in dismissing the complaint on the ground of prescription?

RULING

No, the Ombudsman did not commit grave abuse of discretion. The Supreme Court affirmed the dismissal, ruling that the applicable law governing the prescription of offenses under R.A. No. 3019 is Act No. 3326, not the Revised Penal Code. Section 2 of Act No. 3326 explicitly provides that the prescriptive period shall begin to run from the day of the commission of the violation, and if not known at the time, from its discovery. The Court, citing the precedent in Presidential Ad Hoc Fact-Finding Committee on Behest Loans vs. Desierto, held that for violations of R.A. No. 3019, the general rule is that prescription commences from the commission of the offense. The exception—commencement from discovery—applies only if the violation was not known at the time it was committed.
In this case, the loan transactions were public records, duly approved by the DBP Board through a resolution. Therefore, the violations, if any, were known or discoverable at the time of their commission in the 1970s. The prescriptive period thus began to run from the date of each transaction and had long prescribed by the time the complaint was filed in 1997. The Ombudsman’s application of the law was correct and did not constitute grave abuse of discretion amounting to lack or excess of jurisdiction. The petition was denied.