Supreme Court acquits two death-row marijuana accused over illegal search
The Philippine Supreme Court on 19 February 2001 acquitted Nasario Molina and Gregorio Mula, who had been sentenced to death for 946.9 grams of marijuana seized in Davao City in 1996, ruling the warrantless arrest and search illegal and ordering both men released.
On 19 February 2001 the Philippine Supreme Court acquitted Nasario Molina and Gregorio Mula, who had been sentenced to death for possessing 946.9 grams of dried marijuana, ruling that the warrantless arrest and search that produced the drugs were illegal.[1][2]The court ordered both men released unless they were held for other offences.[1][2]
Police had stopped the two men on the morning of 8 August 1996 as they rode a trisikad past NHA in Ma-a, Davao City, acting on a tip that an alleged marijuana pusher would pass that way.[1][2]Officers opened a bag handed over by Mula and found the marijuana inside.[1][2]The Davao City Regional Trial Court, Branch 17, convicted both men of violating Section 8 of the Dangerous Drugs Act and sentenced them to death by lethal injection.[1][2]
The Supreme Court held the police had no probable cause to make the arrest: the officers had never seen Molina before that day, learned the men’s names only after arresting them, and saw nothing suspicious before stopping the trisikad.[1][2]Because the arrest was unlawful, the search and the seized marijuana were inadmissible, leaving no evidence to sustain the conviction.[1][2]
Case data
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