Getting Prepared For The Philippines > Laws, Regulations, Taxes as Applied to Foreigners

Self Defense Laws in the RP

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Gray Wolf:

http://www.abogadomo.com/law-professor/law-professor-archives/self-defense 

Self-Defense
(Philippine) criminal laws provide for instances where a person may defend himself and not be prosecuted for what would normally be a criminal action. Under Section 1, Article 11 of the Revised Penal Code of the Philippines, the following do not incur any criminal liability:

“Anyone who acts in defense of his person or rights, provided that the following circumstances concur;

First. Unlawful aggression.

Second. Reasonable necessity of the means employed to prevent or repel it.

Third. Lack of sufficient provocation on the part of the person defending himself.”

The justifying circumstance of self-defense “is an affirmative allegation that must be proven with certainty by sufficient, satisfactory and convincing evidence that excludes any vestige of criminal aggression on the part of the person invoking it.” (People v. Nacuspag, 115 SCRA 172 [1982]) Where the accused has admitted that he is the author of the death of the deceased, it is incumbent upon the appellant, in order to avoid criminal liability, to prove this justifying circumstance (self-defense) claimed by him, to the satisfaction of the court. To do so, he must rely on the strength of his own evidence, and not on the weakness of the prosecution for even if it were weak, it could not be disbelieved after the accused admitted the killing.

It is basic that for self-defense to prosper, the following requisites must concur: (1) there must be unlawful aggression by the victim; (2) that the means employed to prevent or repel such aggression were reasonable; and (3) that there was lack of sufficient provocation on the part of the person defending himself. We shall now discuss the following requisites in detail:

A. Unlawful Aggression:

Unlawful aggression presupposes an actual or imminent danger on the life or limb of a person. Mere shouting, intimidating or threatening attitude of the victim, assuming that to be true, does not constitute unlawful aggression. Real aggression presupposes an act positively strong, showing the wrongful intent of the aggressor, which is not merely a threatening or intimidating attitude, but a material attack. Examples are the pointing of a gun or the brandishing of a knife or other deadly weapon.

B. Reasonable necessity of the means employed:

Whether the means employed is reasonable or not, will depend upon the kind of weapon of the aggressor, his physical condition, character, size, and other circumstances as well as those of the person attacked and the time and place of the attack. Although a knife is more dangerous than a club, its use is reasonable if there is no other available means of defense at the disposal of the accused.

C. Lack of sufficient provocation on the part of the person defending himself:

“Sufficient” means proportionate to the damage caused by the act, and adequate to stir one to its commission. Imputing to a person the utterance of vulgar language is sufficient provocation. This element refers to the person defending himself and is essentially inseparable and co-existent with the idea of self-defense.

__________________________________________________

http://www.lawphil.net/statutes/acts/act_3815_1930.html

CHAPTER TWO

Justifying Circumstances and Circumstances which Exempt from Criminal Liability

Article 11. Justifying circumstances. - The following do not incur any criminal liability:

1. Anyone who acts in defense of his person or rights, provided that the following circumstances concur;

First. Unlawful aggression;

Second. Reasonable necessity of the means employed to prevent or repel it;

Third. Lack of sufficient provocation on the part of the person defending himself.

2. Any one who acts in defense of the person or rights of his spouse, ascendants, descendants, or legitimate, natural or adopted brothers or sisters, or of his relatives by affinity in the same degrees, and those by consanguinity within the fourth civil degree, provided that the first and second requisites prescribed in the next preceding circumstance are present, and the further requisite, in case the provocation was given by the person attacked, that the one making defense had no part therein.

3. Anyone who acts in defense of the person or rights of a stranger, provided that the first and second requisites mentioned in the first circumstance of this article are present and that the person defending be not induced by revenge, resentment, or other evil motive.

4. Any person who, in order to avoid an evil or injury, does an act which causes damage to another, provided that the following requisites are present;

First. That the evil sought to be avoided actual exists;

Second. That the injury feared be greater than that done to avoid it;

Third. That there be no other practical and less harmful means of preventing it. ...

Article 12. Circumstances which exempt from criminal liability. - The following are exempt from criminal liability...

6. Any person who acts under the impulse of an uncontrollable fear of an equal or greater injury.

southern92:
I\'m going to have to read that a couple 3 more times to see if I really get it, but it does seem to indicate that the use of potentially deadly force by anyone is not is not incur criminal liability if the conditions in Grey Wolf\'s post are met.  It would not matter if it was a butcher knife or Asawa\'s gun.  And in my opinion, using Asawa\'s gun would place me in much less danger because I could effectively use it at a greater range.
More reading to follow.

dylanaz:
Nice info - thanks!


BIG westerners beware !


--- Quote ---Article 12. Circumstances which exempt from criminal liability. - The following are exempt from criminal liability...

6. Any person who acts under the impulse of an uncontrollable fear of an equal or greater injury.
--- End quote ---

Locals can \'take you out\' legally  :o

coutts00:
We will need a legal determination on this, does self apply to others in the household, if others are threatened and not you, i.e. someone in the household upsets somone elese and they come for them and the bad guy says he is not here for you or your asawa but somone else? How would the law apply...?

Steve & Myrlita:

--- Quote from: Wayne Coutts on March 17, 2010, 12:44:31 PM ---We will need a legal determination on this, does self apply to others in the household, if others are threatened and not you, i.e. someone in the household upsets someone else and they come for them and the bad guy says he is not here for you or your asawa but someone else? How would the law apply...?

--- End quote ---
Also we still need legal clarification as to whether or not the self defense law does indeed apply equally to everyone or just Filipino citizens only. We must not forget that we here in the RP are living in a very proud, nationalistic country which tends to strongly protect its own. Even if the law says we can, in reality, can we ever really win here? Remember, courts will never allow a Filipino citizen to ever lose face to a foreigner, even if he\'s wrong. Food for thought. God Bless....

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