This case has been cited 1 times or more.
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2009-02-27 |
CHICO-NAZARIO, J. |
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| It must be noted that the 18 November 1997 Order of Judge Cruz granting the motion of the prosecution to Withdraw the Information for Murder and Frustrated Murder was in effect an affirmation by the trial court of the Justice Secretary's directive to downgrade the crimes against Jovito and to exclude Jaime from these crimes. As discussed earlier, such grant by Judge Cruz, absent any independent evaluation on his part of the merits of the resolution of the Justice Secretary, constituted an abdication of his power, rendering the said Order void. The rule in this jurisdiction is that orders which are void can never attain finality.[20] Since the 18 November 1997 Order is void, the same has never attained finality. Besides, assuming arguendo that the 18 November 1997 Order was valid, the same could not have an adverse effect on the 7 December 2004 Order of Judge Hidalgo. As has been noted, a timely motion for reconsideration was filed on the 18 November 1997 Order and Judge Cruz merely stated therein that he could not resolve the merits of the dropping of Jaime from all the cases and the downgrading of the crimes charged since the subject cases were already transferred to Judge Hidalgo. In the subject order of Judge Cruz, he even stated that the said issues could only be resolved by Judge Hidalgo, before whom the cases were pending. In other words, since Judge Cruz was divested of jurisdiction, the issue of the dropping of Jaime from all charges and the downgrading of the charges against Jovito was not resolved by the 18 November 1997 Order. It was therefore proper for Judge Hidalgo to resolve such issue since he had jurisdiction over the cases. | |||||