The defendant in this case was charged in the Court of First Instance of Manila with the crime of defraudacion de  propiedad  literaria (fraud or infringement of literary rights or property) as defined and penalized in article 539 of the Penal Code.  The information charges substantially that the defendant, with intent to defraud, and to the prejudice of the complaining  witness, the owner of  a  certain literary work, a "Reduction  Table," feloniously, fraudulently  and without authority copied,  printed  and  reproduced  this  "Reduction  Table" and sold and  distributed fraudulent copies thereof  to the  damage and prejudice of the complaining witness in  the sum of P3,000.

Defendant was duly arraigned  and pleaded not guilty in one  of  the  divisions  of the  Court of First Instance of Manila, and after certain further proceedings which it is not necessary to set out at this  time,  the case was transferred to the division of that court presided over by the Hon. A. S. Crossfield, before whom it was tried.

The prosecution presented a number of witnesses  whose testimony tended to support the truth of the allegations of the  information touching  the unauthorized reproduction and sale by the defendant of the pamphlet or booklet, containing tables  of comparative values of  weights and measures in  the metric system and the  system of weights and measures commonly known  as  the  English  system,  which is referred to in the following certificate, signed and  sealed by the chief of the division of archives, patents, copyrights and trade-marks, and dated May  10, 1909.

"This is to certify that by the records of the division of archives,  patents, copyrights and  trade-marks, it appears that Manuel  Casteil,  of the city of Manila, Philippine Islands, did, on the eighth day  of May, nineteen hundred and  nine, deposit in said division for registration a book entitled 'Tabla de Reduccion,' and the date of the receipt thereof was duly noted and recorded; and protection thereof will  remain in force from said date in accordance with the Spanish Law of Jan. 10, 1879, royal decrees of Sept. 3, 1880, and  May 5, 1887."

Thereafter  the Government  closed  its  case  and  the defendant moved for a dismissal  on the ground that the evidence submitted on behalf of the Government did not establish  the  commission of the  offense charged in the information, or of any offense defined and penalized by law. Judgment on this motion was  reserved by the  court at the  request of counsel for both parties, who desired to submit briefs on  the legal questions  raised by the motion. Pending judgment on the motion,  defendant submitted his evidence.  Subsequently, upon consideration of the motion to dismiss submitted after the Government closed its case, and  as to which judgment had been reserved, the  court below sustained the  motion and  discharged  the defendant.

The  trial  court based its judgment dismissing the  information and discharging the defendant on the ground that no copyright law exists in the Philippine Islands and that the complaining witness could have no exclusive  rights in the pamphlet in question which were subject to  violation or infringement, so as to sustain a conviction under article 539  of the  Penal  Code.   No finding was made as to the alleged facts touching the reproduction  by the defendant of the pamphlet of which ownership is claimed by the complaining witness.

The  case has been brought here by the  Government in an attempt to appeal from the judgment of the court below. We are asked to reverse that judgment  and grant a new trial, on the ground that the trial judge erred in declaring that no copyright law  is in  force in these Islands.   But without  going  into the question  of the correctness of  the conclusions of  law upon  which the trial judge  based  his action, we are all agreed that the government had no right of appeal from the judgment entered by the court below dismissing the  information and discharging the defendant.

The allowance of an appeal by  the  Government would undoubtedly place the defendant twice in jeopardy in violation of the provisions of the Philippine Bill  of Rights,  set out in the Act  of Congress of July  1, 1902, as those provisions have  been  construed by the  Supreme Court  of  the United States in the case of Kepner vs. United States (195 U. S., 100;  11 Phil. Rep., 669).

Defendant was regularly arraigned, pleaded not  guilty, put upon his trial by the calling of the government's witnesses against  him, and thereafter  discharged by the trial court.  It  is true that the court made  no express finding as to whether  the  defendant did  or did not commit  the specific acts set out in the information, and  that the dismissal of the information was based on the court's conclusion of law that there being no copyright law in force in these Islands, the acts which it is alleged were  committed by the defendant do not constitute the crime with which he was charged, nor any  other offense  defined and penalized by law.  But the reasoning and authority of the opinion of the Supreme Court of the  United States in the case of Kepner vs. United States, supra, is  conclusively against  the right of  appeal by  the government from a judgment discharging the defendant in a criminal case after he has been brought to trial, whether defendant was acquitted on  the merits or whether  defendant's discharge  was based upon the trial  court's conclusion of law that the trial  had failed for some reason to  establish  the guilt of the defendant as charged.

As  indicated  in the opinion in that case,  the  protection afforded by the prohibition against the putting of any person twice in jeopardy for the same  offense, is a  protection not merely  against the peril of second punishment, but against being tried a second time for the same offense.   In that case the court expressly held that:

"It follows that Military Order No. 58, as  amended  by Act of the Philippine Commission, No, 194, in so far as it undertakes  to permit an appeal by the Government after acquittal, was repealed by the Act  of Congress of July, 1902, providing  immunity from second jeopardy for  the same criminal offense."

But the reasoning of the opinion goes further and denies the right to the Government to procure the reversal of erroneous proceedings and commence anew, save only in those cases in which the fir3t proceeding did not create legal jeopardy.  So that, without his own consent, a defendant who has once been brought to trial in a court of competent jurisdiction cannot  be  again put  on trial for  the same offense after the first trial has  terminated by a judgment directing his discharge, whether his discharge be the result of a formal acquittal, or of a ruling of the court upon some question  of law arising  at the trial.

This  court has frequently  held  that  legal jeopardy attaches  in  criminal  proceedings in this jurisdiction after arraignment and  plea in a court of competent jurisdiction, at the moment when the first witness is called to the stand and interrogated, and it is  quite clear that the defendant in this case having  been brought to trial after arraignment and plea and all the government's witnesses having testified on his trial, is entitled to protection against the peril  of being again brought to  trial for the offense with which  he was charged at that trial and this whether the rulings  of the trial judge on which he based his order discharging the defendant and dismissing the information were or were not erroneous.  (U. S. vs. Ballentine, 4 Phil. Rep., 672; U.  S. vs. Montiel, 7 Phil. Rep.,  272;  U.  S. vs. Gemora, 8 Phil. Rep.,  19.)

What is said in the following citation from the decision of the Supreme  Court  in  the case of Kepner vs.  U.  S., supra, and the observations of Mr. Bishop therein quoted, have a proper place in this opinion as bearing directly on the precise point under consideration.

"We are not here dealing with those statutes which give to the Government a right of review upon the steps merely preliminary to a trial and before the accused is legally put in jeopardy,  as where a  discharge  is had upon motion to quash or a demurrer to the indictment is sustained before jeopardy has attached.  Such statutes have been quite gen- erally sustained in jurisdictions which  deny the right of second trial  where a competent court has convicted  or acquitted  the accused.  (People vs. Webb, 38  Cal., 467.) Mr.  Bishop, in his work upon  Criminal  Law, sums up the scope and authority of such statutes as follows:

" 'A legislative  provision for the rehearing of criminal causes can not be  interpreted - or, at least, it can not have force - to violate the constitutional rule under consideration, whatever be the words in  which the provision is expressed. When, therefore, a defendant  has been once in jeopardy, the jeopardy  can not be repeated without his consent, whatever statute may exist on the subject.  Such a statute will be interpreted with the Constitution, and be held to apply only to cases where it constitutionally may.  And if it undertakes to give to the State the right of appeal, to retry the party  charged, after acquittal,  it is invalid.  And so  the writ of error, or the like, allowed to the State, can authorize the State to procure the reversal of erroneous  proceedings and commence anew, only in those cases in which the first proceeding did not create legal jeopardy.'   (1 Bishop Criminal  Law  (5th Ed.), section 1026.)"

The appeal entered in this case on behalf of the Government should be dismissed  with  costs against the appellant. So ordered.

Torres, Mapa, Johnson, Moreland, and Trent, JJ., concur.