As stated in Sec.
1, Rule 112 of the Rules of Criminal Procedure, preliminary investigation is
defined as an inquiry or proceeding to determine whether there is sufficient ground to engender a
well-founded belief that a crime has been committed and the respondent is probably guilty
thereof, and should be held for trial. It is not a trial on merits but determine probable cause or the
persons who may be reasonably charged with a crime. The right of the respondent to preliminary
investigation is a component part of due process. It is not a mere formal or technical right but a
substantive right that is an indispensable element of the criminal justice system. To deny the
claim of the accused to a preliminary investigation would be to deprive him the full measures of
his right to due process. The role and object of preliminary investigation were to secure the
innocent against hasty, malicious, and oppressive prosecution and to protect him from an open
and public accusation of a crime and anxiety of a public trial. Nevertheless, the right to
preliminary investigation can be waived expressly or by implications or as general rule, it can be
deemed waived when the accused fails to invoke it before or at the time of entering a plea at
arraignment. The determination of the existence of probable cause lies within the discretion of
the public prosecutor after conduction a preliminary investigation upon the complaint of an
offended party. Consequently, in the case of Claridad v. Esteban, the settled policy is that the
courts will not interfere with the executive determination of probable cause for the purpose of
filing an information, in the absence of grave abuse of discretion. That abuse of discretion must
be so patent and gross as to amount to an evasion of positive duty or a virtual refusal to perform
a duty enjoined by law or to act at all in contemplation of law, such as where the power is
exercised in an arbitrary and despotic manner by reason of passion or hostility.
