Civil Law Review 2020 040 People vs.

Rafanan
NCC 38-39, RPC Art. 12 1991 Feliciano

FACTS

Appellant Policarpio Rafanan, Jr. was charged of raping Estelita Ronaya, who was 14 years old at the time of the
commission of the act. Prior to the act, Estelita went to the store owned by the family of Rafanan to help in
closing. At 11:00PM on March 16, 1976, Rafanan was alleged to have forced Estelita in having sexual
intercourse and threatened the latter by pointing a bolo to her throat to not report the incident to anyone. It
was only on March 18, 1976 when Estelita, accompanied by her mother, reported the incident to the police.
The lower convicted Rafanan guilty of the crime of rape.

On appeal, Rafanan claimed that he was suffering from schizophrenia at the time when he committed the acts.
The trial was suspended since Rafanan was confined to the National Mental Hospital in Mandaluyong for
observation and treatment from December 29, 1976 until June 26, 1978.

During his confinement, there were 4 clinical reports on the mental and physical condition of Rafanan. In the
first 2 reports prepared in 1977, it was observed that Rafanan was suffering from a mental disorder called
schizophrenia, manifested by carelessness in grooming, sluggishness in movements, staring vacuously,
indifference, smiling inappropriately, refusal to verbalize, emotional dullness, mental inaccessibility,
seclusiveness, preoccupation, disorientation, and perceptual aberrations of hearing strange sounds. In the 3rd
report, he was described have become better behaved, responsive, and neat in person. In the last report on
June 26, 1978, he was said to be behaved, helpful in household chores, and no longer talking while alone.

When the trial resumed, Dr. Nerit, a defense witness, suggested that Rafanan was sick one or two years before
his admission to the hospital, in effect implying that Rafanan was already suffering from schizophrenia when
he raped Estelita. Rafanan raised the defense under Art. 12 of the RPC wherein the circumstance of imbecility
or insanity, unless acting during a lucid interval, exempts the accused from criminal liability.

RATIO

W/N Rafanan’s defense of insanity will qualify as an exempting circumstance

No. The Court in People vs. Formigones laid down the required standards for legal insanity:
1. Test of cognition - That there be a complete deprivation of intelligence in committing the act:
i. That the accused be deprived of reason;
ii. That there be no responsibility for his own acts;
iii. That he acts without the least discernment;
2. Or Test of volition - That there be a total deprivation of freedom of the will

The Court in this case noted that our caselaw shows common reliance on the test of cognition. There has
been no case where the Court exempted an accused on the sole ground that he was totally deprived of
freedom of the will without an accompanying complete deprivation of intelligence.

Schizophrenia pleaded by appellant has been described as a chronic mental disorder characterized by
inability to distinguish between fantasy and reality, and often accompanied by hallucinations and delusion.
It is formerly called dementia praecox and is the most common form of psychosis. For it to be an exempting
circumstance, the evidence presented must show that there was impairment of the faculties, such that it was
complete as to deprive the accused of intelligence or the consciousness of his acts.

As testified by Dr. Jovellano, the psychiatrist who examined and treated Rafanan, accused was not
completely devoid of any consciousness of whatever he did in connection with the incident of the case. Dr.
Jovellano mentioned that the acts of the accused (threatening the victim, forcing her to lie down, removing
the panty of the victim, knows that the victim has a vagina upon which he will place his penis) involved
consciousness because such acts are primitive acts of any individual. The difference only in the act of an
insane and a normal individual, a normal individual will use the power of reasoning and consciousness
within the standard of society while an insane is already devoid of the fact that he could no longer withstand
himself in the ordinary environment, yet his acts are within the bound of insanity or psychosis.

The fact that appellant Rafanan threatened complainant Estelita with death should she revealed she had
been sexually assaulted by him, indicates, to the mind of the Court, that Rafanan was aware of the
reprehensible moral quality of that assault.

It is argued that a person suffering from schizophrenia sustains not only impairment of the mental faculties
but also deprivation of the power of self-control. However, as already mentioned, it is complete loss of
intelligence which must be shown if the exempting circumstance of insanity is to be found. Equally
important also is that it must be shown that the mental state of the accused should relate to the period
immediately before or at the very moment the act is committed.

In this case, the testimonies of the physicians did not purport to characterize his mental condition during the
period of the act. Their testimonies consisted of broad statements based on general behavioral patterns of
people afflicted with schizophrenia.

The Court credited the schizophrenic reaction as a mitigating circumstance, i.e., as an illness which
diminishes the exercise of the offender's will-power without, however, depriving him of the consciousness
of his acts.