A fighting cock handler was sentenced to suffer 40 years in prison yesterday for allegedly raping the teenage niece of his co-worker, in Escalante City, Negros Occidental, about six years ago.
San Carlos City, Negros Occidental, Regional Trial Court Branch 58 Judge Danilo Amisola, found Josie Divinagracia, “alias Bebing” guilty beyond reasonable doubt.
The judge also ordered him to pay the victim P100,000 civil indemnity and moral damages and that he be committed to the Bureau of Corrections in Muntinlupa.
Information filed by San Carlos City Prosecutor Ranela De la Fuente in court showed that the victim, 15, whose name is being withheld, was watching the Junior-Senior Prom and the search for Miss Gay at the Japitan Highschool in Escalante City at about 2 a.m. on February 12, 2005 with her friend, Joan Salazar, when the suspect arrived and grabbed her by the hand.
The victim also testified in court that Divinagracia, who was under the influence of liquor brought her to a dark area near the school, where he raped her.
Carpenter Rudy Mahinay, her uncle and a co-worker of Divinagracia, told the court that on February 12, the suspect arrived at their workplace at the house Numeriano Talita and told him that he was able to have sex with a teenager.
Mahinay said he later learned it was his niece who was raped, and, based on what Salazar and his niece had told him about the description of the suspect and how the molestation happened, he began to entertain the possibility that it was Divinagracia who did it.
Divinagracia, meanwhile, told the court that he was at Numeriano Talita’s place when the rape happened and later he went to the Japitan High School at about 9 p.m. where he helped in loading and unloading the sound boxes and sound system equipment to be used for the school activity that night, before going home at about midnight on of February 13 and never went out later.
He said he did not know the victim and her family, and neither did he see the victim on the night the rape happened.
In his 19-page decision, Amisola stressed that, for a rape charge to prosper, the prosecution must prove that the offender had carnal knowledge of a woman and he accomplished such act through force, threat or intimidation, when she is deprived of reason or otherwise conscious, or when she was under 12 years of age, or was demented.
The complainant, in her testimony on May 27, 2008, positively identified Divinagracia as the person who raped her and her testimony was clear and straightforward, and she was consistent in her recollection of details, the judge said.
The judge added that Divinagracia’s proximity to the scene of the crime two hours before the rape was committed refutes his defense of alibi.
Other witnesses presented in court to strengthen the case against Divinagracia were Escalante City Health Officer Nelly Añonuevo, the victim’s younger brother.*APN back
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