A Negrense poultry and fertilizer businessman, sentenced to 20 years imprisonment for carnapping, has been granted bail by the Regional Trial Court in Cadiz City.

In an eight-page decision, Cadiz Regional Trial Court judge Renato Muñez, who earlier found Steneil Young guilty beyond reasonable doubt of violating the Anti-Carnapping Act of 1972, has recommended bail of P1,500,000 or P75,000 for each year of Young's sentence.

Although the decision to grant bail was promulgated on March 29, Young, who filed his petition on Dec. 15, 2005, has yet to post bail for his temporary liberty.

Young was sentenced to 17 years four months minimum to 20 years maximum imprisonment and was ordered to pay P580,000 by way of reparation for the cost of the truck and P35,000 per month starting from July 18, 1992 up to the present by way of indemnification for unrealized income of the carnapped cargo truck.

The probability of flight is most remote under the circumstances since Young has two young children who constantly rely on him for guidance and has a poultry business and piggery farm, which needs his supervision, Muñez said.

In its supplemental opposition, the prosecution had contended that Young had committed the same offense twice, making him a recidivist, a quasi recidivist and a habitual delinquent.

Young was earlier found guilty by Bacolod RTC judge Roberto Chiongson for violating the anti-carnapping law for defacing serial numbers the engines and chassis of the truck.

But Muñez said Young is not a recidivist because the offenses he committed were special crimes defined and penalized under special laws and not under the same title in the revised penal code.

The judge also said that Young is not a quasi recidivist because he did not commit a new felony before he began his sentence or while serving his sentence.

Young does not qualify the description of habitual delinquency because the tag only applies when an offender commits another offense within ten years from his release or last conviction, Muñez said.

Young and four others were accused of unlawfully forcing at gunpoint Prospero Henoguin, who was driving an Isuzu 10-wheeler cargo truck owned by Romeo Gaurana, to drive the vehicle southwards towards Bago City where he and his helper were forced to alight in the evening of July 18, 1992.

Thereafter the vehicle was dismantled and chopped into pieces at the V-4 Farm Enterprises in Valladolid that is owned by Young. Parts of the carnapped vehicle were later recovered buried underground, and the engine with defaced serial number was recovered from Hunter Motor bodega in Bacolod City owned by George Uy. *CPT

back to top