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Corpus delicti in its legal sense refers to the fact of the commission of the crime, not to the physical body of the deceased or to the ashes of a burned building or — as in the present case — to the smuggled cigarettes.
- G.R. No. 243024
Corpus delicti is the body, foundation or substance of a...
- G.R. No. 243024
In the crime of theft, corpus delicti has two elements: 1) that personal property is lost by its owner, and 2) that it was lost through felonious taking.34 In this case, the Court notes that the evidence for the prosecution is largely circumstantial.
Corpus delicti is the body, foundation or substance of a crime. It refers to the fact of the commission of the crime, not to the physical body of the deceased. Because corpus delicti may be proven by circumstantial evidence, it is not necessary for the prosecution to present direct evidence to prove the corpus delicti.
The corpus delicti is a compound fact made up of two elements, namely: the existence of a certain act or result forming the basis of the criminal charge, and the existence of a criminal agency as the cause of the act or result.
In the prosecution of drugs cases, the procedural safeguards embodied in Sec. 21 of R.A. No. 9165 and its Implementing Rules and Regulations (IRR) are material, as their compliance affects the corpus delicti which is the dangerous drug itself.
Where the State fails to comply with the said rules, the Court imposes upon the prosecution the duty to present evidence that would demonstrate the identity of each individual in the chain of custody, and the manner of handling the corpus delicti, which is the dangerous drug itself.
In drug cases, the dangerous drug itself is the very corpus delicti of the violation of the law.11 While it is true that a buy-bust operation is a legally effective and proven procedure, sanctioned by law, for apprehending drug peddlers and distributors,12 the law nevertheless also requires strict compliance with procedures laid down by it to ...
