6/7/2020 E-Library - Information At Your Fingertips: Printer Friendly The Court may revise such findings in its rare and extraordinary role of a trier of facts only when the appellants convincingly demonstrate that such findings were either erroneous, or biased, or unfounded, or incomplete, or unreliable, or conflicted with the findings of fact of the CA.[13] Alas, that demonstration was not made herein. The records show that the Prosecution presented the complainants themselves to establish that the accused-appellants had made the complainants believe that they could deploy them abroad for a fee despite their having had no license or authority to do so from the proper government agency; receipts; and the certification from the POEA on the lack of the license to recruit having been issued in favor of the accusedappellants. In contrast, the accused-appellants offered only denial. Such defense was futile because denial, essentially a negation of a fact, did not prevail over the affirmative assertions of the fact. The courts – trial as well as appellate – have generally viewed denial in criminal cases with considerable caution, if not outright rejection. This dismissive judicial attitude comes from the recognition that denial is inherently weak and unreliable by virtue of its being an excuse too easy and too convenient for the guilty to make. Denial, to be worthy of consideration at all, should be substantiated by clear and convincing evidence. Hence, the appeal of the accused should also fail because it relied solely on negative and self-serving negations. Verily, the denial carried no weight in law and had no greater evidentiary value than the testimonies of credible witnesses of the Prosecution who testified on affirmative matters.[14] We next ascertain if the CA properly affirmed the imposition of the penalties for illegal recruitment in large scale and the three counts of estafa. Under Section 7(b)[15] of the Migrant Workers' Act, the penalty for illegal recruitment in large scale is life imprisonment and fine of not less than P500,000.00 nor more than P1,000,000.00 Although Republic Act No. 10022,[16] approved on March 8, 2010, has since introduced an amendment to the Migrant Workers' Act to raise the imposable fine to not less than P2,000,000.00 nor more than P5,000,000.00, the amendment does not apply herein because the illegal recruitment subject of this case was committed in October and November, 2002, or long before the amendment took effect. Accordingly, we hold that the RTC and CA correctly imposed life imprisonment and fine of P1,000,000.00.[17] For the three counts of estafa, the relevant legal provision is Article 315, first paragraph, of the Revised Penal Code, which provides: Article 315. Swindling (estafa). - Any person who shall defraud another by any of the means mentioned herein below shall be punished by: 1st. The penalty of prision correccional in its maximum period to prision mayor in its minimum period, if the amount of the fraud is over 12,000 pesos but does not exceed 22,000 pesos; and if such amount exceeds the latter sum, the penalty provided in this paragraph shall be imposed in its elibrary.judiciary.gov.ph/thebookshelf/showdocsfriendly/1/62691 12/16