The Supreme Court said Sunday the criminal cases in the trial courts were being resolved much faster compared to the previous years, and following the implementation of its Revised Guidelines of Continuous Trial in Criminal Cases since September last year.
Chief Justice Teresita Leonardo-de Castro said the trials in many drug cases were being resolved within two to two-and-a-half months from the time they were filed as required by the Comprehensive Dangerous Drugs Act, while the trials in other criminal cases were being finished within six months pursuant to the Speedy Trial Act.
The pertinent provisions of both laws were incorporated in the guidelines released by the high court.
The Court said 47.82 of cases had complied with the 180-day period for trial provided by law and the Rules of Court compared to the 2.36-percent before the revised guidelines took effect.
The Court said cases were also being decided faster, with 68.5 percent of the judgments having been promulgated within the 90-day period required under the Constitution compared with only 37.75 percent in previous cases.
“We are still at the early stages of implementation and I expect the results to be better in the months ahead,” said Associate Justice Diosdado Peralta who drafted the Revised Guidelines.
Peralta said the innovations and simplification introduced in the Guidelines were intended to remove the redundancies in criminal procedure.
“The guidelines try to address the bottlenecks we saw in criminal cases,” he said.
Among others things, the revised guidelines provide a list of prohibited pleadings that cause delays in criminal cases and require judges to pre-schedule all hearing dates.
“The trial dates for both the prosecution and defense are set during arraignment. This is binding on the parties and cannot be rescheduled,” said Peralta, adding that the postponements of hearings had been considered a major cause of delay.
He said the 15-day period required under the Comprehensive Dangerous Drugs Act of 2002 to decide drugs cases reached an all-time high of 57.37 percent compared to the pre-Guidelines rate of 12.58 percent.
The high court 2017 saw a rise in the number of drug cases, with 289,295 filed with the trial courts but only 34,673 or 12 percent disposed.
“Although we are failing in drug cases insofar as the 60-day period to finish trial from the filing of the Information is concerned, these cases were nevertheless decided within the 10-month period since the implementation of the Guidelines,” Peralta said.
Out of the 94,209 drug cases filed from September 2017 to June this year, 7.89 percent complied with the 60-day trial period compared to the 0.02 percent before implementation.
“Our judges are trying their best, and we have seen improvements in drug the cases because of continuous trials,” Peralta said.
The Revised Guidelines on Continuous Trial in Criminal Cases took effect on Sept. 1, 2017 after it was piloted in 54 trial courts in Metro Manila.
The program was implemented with support from The Asia Foundation and the American Bar Association, with funding from the United States Agency for International Development.