Republic vs. Claur,
G.R. No. 246868, February 15, 2022
LAZARO-JAVIER, J.
[Case Digest]
Facts:
Angelique
Pearl sought to have her marriage with Mark declared void ab initio on the
ground that they were both psychologically incapacitated. Mark failed to file
his answer despite notice.
Angelique
Pearl testified that she and Mark were schoolmates in high school. She had a
crush on Mark even though he had a notorious reputation for being flirtatious
and for drinking alcohol at such a young age. She got Mark's mobile number from
their common friends. Soon after, she became his girlfriend. During their
relationship, she discovered that Mark was the "jealous type" and was
too obsessed with her. At the same time though, she also found out that Mark
was still texting other girls and had been lying to her. Mark also had the
habit of not disclosing his whereabouts to her. When Mark tried to break up
with her, she threatened to commit suicide. On the other hand, when she would
try to break up with him, Mark would devise a way for her to stay in the
relationship. He would manipulate her dormmates to convince her not to break up
with him. He would also wait outside her dorm and even call her parents. For
about three (3) to six (6) months, they alternated between breaking up and
reconciling.
When they went to different universities for
college, Mark's jealousy had escalated as well as their fights. They would
curse each other and sometimes their quarrels would turn physically violent.
During the five (5) years of their boyfriend-girlfriend relationship, they
broke up and reconciled around twenty (20) times.
Then, she got pregnant unexpectedly. She was only twenty
(20) years old while Mark was twenty-one (21) years old at that time. When
her parents found out, they did not consider marriage as an option. She, too,
was hesitant about it. But Mark insisted that they get married. His parents
even deceived her by promising that she and Mark would move to the United
States of America if she married their son. Thus, on January 3, 2009, they tied
the knot at the Ascension Chapel of Villa Escudero.
Not long after, she discovered all the lies that Mark fed
her. One of them was when Mark made her believe that he was only one (1)
semester away from his college graduation. But the truth was, he still needed
several years to finish his degree. Another was when Mark told her that his
father was working for a certain company. She found out though that Mark's
father was a security guard.
Subsequently, they moved in with her parents in Quezon.
Since she was used to their household helper doing chores for her, she did not
unpack their things. Mark got irritated and threw the bags at her. She
retaliated by hitting him with her "happy feet" clogs. Mark sustained
a laceration in the head which bled. He panicked because he feared the sight of
blood. But instead of helping Mark, she did not do anything and simply watched
him as his head continued to bleed. It was her mother who helped Mark clean the
wound and stop the bleeding. She did not tell her mother what happened because
she thought her mother would not believe her anyway.
On April 4, 2009, their son Malique Antonio was born.
Mark, nonetheless, wanted to end their relationship. They separated several
times, each incident lasting for a few days or a week. Mark had a habit of
leaving her and their child to meet up with his friends whenever he got upset.
Their married life had been marred by quarrels, disagreements, and even
violence. There was one (1) incident when he accidentally locked her up in the
bathroom. When she finally got out, she and Mark fought and he hit her in the
face, breaking her jaw.
Dr. Jay Madelon Castillo-Carcereny testified that she is
a physician and a psychiatrist. Based on the interviews and tests she conducted;
she diagnosed Angelique Pearl with "borderline personality disorder."
As for Mark, although she was not able to personally examine him, the
information she gathered from Angelique Pearl and Antonio, who personally saw
Mark's coping mechanisms when the couple lived with them, was adequate for her
to diagnose Mark with "narcissistic personality disorder."
Dr. Castillo-Carcereny explained that the root cause of
their personality disorders was their respective dysfunctional families
classified as "double bind" in Mark's case and "pseudo
hostility" in Angelique Pearl's case. They had developed it during
childhood and had become deeply entrenched in their persons such that neither
of them thought they were problems, Any medication or recommended
treatment to address the condition would be useless since each of the parties'
personality disorder is "grave, permanent and incurable."
Dr. Castillo-Carcereny recommended that the marriage of
Angelique Pearl and Mark be declared void on the basis of each party's
"psychological incapacity to perform essential marital obligations which
manifested during early adulthood, increasing in gravity and severity from
adolescence to present."
RTC granted the petition for declaration of nullity of
Angelique Pearl and Mark's marriage on the ground of both parties'
psychological incapacity. It found that the totality of evidence shows that
Angelique Pearl and Mark were both psychologically incapacitated to perform
their marital obligations.
On appeal, the OSG argued that the trial court failed to
specify the pieces of evidence pertaining to the supposed existence of the
parties' psychological incapacity. It argued that Angelique Pearl's statements
were "inherently biased and self-serving," Johnson's testimony was
"hearsay," and Dr. Castillo-Carcereny's findings were "not
credible."
Court of Appeals affirmed. It held that from the totality
of evidence presented, the trial court correctly determined that Angelique
Pearl and Mark were both suffering from psychological incapacity characterized
by gravity, juridical antecedence, and incurability.
Issue:
Did
the evidence on record sufficiently support the petition of Angelique Pearl O.
Claur for declaration of nullity of her marriage with Mark A. Claur on ground
of psychological incapacity?
Held:
Yes; in the recent case of Tan-Andal v. Andal, the
Court clarified that "psychological incapacity" should be understood
as a legal concept rather than a medical one. As such, it does not require
clinical diagnosis to be established. Ordinary witnesses who have been present
in the life of the spouses before the latter contracted marriage may testify on
behaviors that they have consistently observed from the supposedly
incapacitated spouse.
Tan-Andal, too, set new parameters in
appreciating the three (3) main criteria for psychological incapacity.
First, gravity still
has to be established, if only to preclude spouses from invoking mild
characterological peculiarities, mood changes, occasional emotional outbursts
as ground for nullity. Second, incurability should also be understood in
the legal sense. So long as the couple's respective personality structures are
so incompatible and antagonistic that the only result of the union would be the
inevitable breakdown of the marriage, the psychological incapacity of a spouse
or both spouses is deemed "incurable". Third, juridical antecedence or
the existence of the condition prior to the celebration of marriage, is a
statutory requirement which must be proven by the spouse alleging psychological
incapacity.
Tan-Andal likewise decreed that the plaintiff-spouse must
prove his or her case by clear and convincing evidence. Notably, this quantum
of proof requires more than preponderant evidence but less than proof beyond
reasonable doubt. The Court, nonetheless, reiterated that judgments in cases
involving the alleged psychological incapacity of a spouse should be based on
the totality of evidence adduced during the course of the proceedings. Each
case must be resolved based on its particular set of facts and Article 36 of
the Family Code applied on a case-to-case basis. For Tan-Andal was not meant to
strait-jacket lower courts, forcing them to apply the guidelines in nullity
cases of all shapes and sizes.
In Republic v. Mola Cruz, the
Court stressed that the findings of the trial court on the existence or non-existence
of a party's psychological incapacity should be final and binding for as long
as such findings and evaluation of the testimonies of witnesses and other
evidence are not shown to be clearly and manifestly erroneous. A sharper
pronouncement on the respect accorded to the trial court's factual findings in
the realm of psychological incapacity was made in Kalaw v. Fernandez,
“It is not enough reason to ignore the findings and evaluation by the
trial court and substitute our own as an appellate tribunal only because the
Constitution and the Family Code regard marriage as an inviolable social
institution. We have to stress that the fulfilment of the constitutional
mandate for the State to protect marriage as an inviolable social institution
only relates to a valid marriage. No protection can be accorded to a marriage
that is null and void ab initio, because such a marriage has no
legal existence.”
Here, the Republic
failed to provide compelling reason to convince the Court to deviate from the
findings of the trial court, as affirmed by the Court of Appeals. The totality
of evidence presented clearly and convincingly show that both Mark and Angelique
Pearl are psychologically incapacitated from discharging their respective
duties as husband and wife.
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