Valerio E. Kalaw vs. Ma. Elena Fernandez (G.R. No. 166357, 14 January 2015)

“SC relaxes rules on psychological incapacity as ground to annul marriages,” says the news title in a popular newspaper. The title naturally got my interest, not because I am filing a petition for nullity of marriage, but because we are handling petitions based on psychological incapacity under under Article 36 of the Family Code. While the news article does not mention the title of the case, it is clearly abundant that it refers to the 2015 case of Valerio E. Kalaw vs. Ma. Elena Fernandez (G.R. No. 166357, 14 January 2015). I combed the case to check how the Supreme Court “relaxed” the rules on petitions for declaration of nullity of marriage based on psychological incapacity. Unfortunately, I cannot find a confirmation of such “relaxation” in the rules. To have a fruitful discussion, allow me to humbly point to ten matters in the case that might be of interest to those who are searching for answers.

1. The rules provided in Molina remains valid

Practitioners refer to the guidelines for the interpretation and application of Article 36 as the Molina Doctrine, considering that the set of guidelines were first compiled in the 1997 case of Republic vs. Court of Appeals and Roridel Olaviano Molina (G.R. No. 108763). There are eight guidelines, as follows:

(1) The burden of proof to show the nullity of the marriage belongs to the plaintiff.

(2) The root cause of the psychological incapacity must be medically or clinically identified, alleged in the complaint, sufficiently proven by experts and clearly explained in the decision.

(3) The incapacity must be proven to be existing at “the time of the celebration” of the marriage.

(4) Such incapacity must also be shown to be medically or clinically permanent or incurable.

(5) Such illness must be grave enough to bring about the disability of the party to assume the essential obligations of marriage.

(6) The essential marital obligations must be those embraced by Articles 68 up to 71 of the Family Code as regards the husband and wife, as well as Articles 220, 221 and 225 of the same Code in regard to parents and their children.

(7) Interpretations given by the National Appellate Matrimonial Tribunal of the Catholic Church in the Philippines, while not controlling or decisive, should be given great respect by our courts.

(8) The trial court must order the prosecuting attorney or fiscal and the Solicitor General to appear as counsel for the state.

In Kalaw, the Supreme Court categorically stated that “we are not suggesting the abandonment of Molina in this case.” The set of guidelines in Molina, therefore, stays. The pronouncement in Kalaw that is closest to “relaxation” of the guidelines is this: “The foregoing guidelines have turned out to be rigid, such that their application to every instance practically condemned the petitions for declaration of nullity to the fate of certain rejection.” There is no doubt that the Molina Doctrine is strict, but there is also no doubt that countless petitions have been granted pursuant to its guidelines. In other words, there appears to be no “relaxation” of the rules.

2. Expert testimony is decisive

If there’s anything in Kalaw that can be construed as a “relaxation” or departure from the Molina Doctrine, it’s the rule on expert witnesses. Guideline No. 2 in Molina provides that the “root cause of the psychological incapacity must be medically or clinically identified, alleged in the complaint, sufficiently proven by experts and clearly explained in the decision.” However, it has been established in previous cases that expert testimony is not a requisite in psychological incapacity cases. In other words, the absence of an expert witness does not automatically result to a denial of the petition. In a number of cases, including the case of Mendoza vs. Republic (G.R. No. 157649, 12 November 2012), the Supreme Court had the occasion to state that “the expert opinions of psychologists are not conditions sine qua non in the granting of petitions for declaration of nullity of marriage,” although the Court added that “the actual medical examination…was to be dispensed with only if the totality of evidence presented was enough to support a finding of his psychological incapacity.”
The requirement of the “totality of evidence,” on the other hand, is not new. It has been discussed in similar cases prior to Kalaw.
Going back to the value of expert testimonies, the Supreme Court in Kalaw restated the rule that “in the task of ascertaining the presence of psychological incapacity as a ground for the nullity of marriage, the courts, which are concededly not endowed with expertise in the field of psychology, must of necessity rely on the opinions of experts in order to inform themselves on the matter, and thus enable themselves to arrive at an intelligent and judicious judgment.”
Incidentally, in one of our cases, the judge noted that it is for the court — not the psychologist — to conclude that one or both parties is/are psychologically incapacitated. Indeed, the existence of psychological incapacity is a legal conclusion, which is within the exclusive province of the court, but this does not preclude the expert witness from expressing a similar “opinion,” pointing to the exact condition or personality disorder of the spouse/s.

3. The psychologist need not personally examine the incapacitated spouse

The usual objection raised against the testimony of the expert witness, especially when the services of the expert witness has been obtained by the petitioner-spouse and there is a conclusion that the respondent-spouse is psychologically incapacitated, is the usual inability of the psychologist to examine or interview the respondent spouse. In Kalaw, the Supreme Court reiterated the rule that “the lack of personal examination and interview of the person diagnosed with personality disorder…did not per se invalidate the findings of the experts.”
The opinion of the expert opinion should not be lightly brushed aside in the presence of the “totality of evidence” in the case. This is the reason why, in the cases we are handling, we require the client to present other witnesses to corroborate the client’s testimony on the facts which constitute the basis for the finding of the personality disorder and, ultimately, psychological incapacity. While clients initially complain about the presentation of other witnesses, we make it a point to carefully explain that this is needed to avoid an outright denial of the petition.

4. Article 36 is patterned after Church doctrines

It has been said that the Philippines is the only country in the whole world that does not have divorce. This, of course, did not deter the Office of the Solicitor General (OSG) to make, in the language of the Supreme Court, an “exaggeration” in Molina that Article 36 is the “most liberal divorce procedure in the world.” In Kalaw, the Supreme Court noted that it was sensitive to the “exaggeration” of the OSG when it enunciated the “rigid” rules in Molina. “The unintended consequences of Molina, however, has taken its toll on people who have to live with deviant behavior, moral insanity and sociopathic personality anomaly, which, like termites, consume little by little the very foundation of their families, our basic social institutions. Far from what was intended by the Court, Molina has become a strait-jacket, forcing all sizes to fit into and be bound by it. Wittingly or unwittingly, the Court, in conveniently applying Molina, has allowed diagnosed sociopaths, schizophrenics, nymphomaniacs, narcissists and the like, to continuously debase and pervert the sanctity of marriage. Ironically, the Roman Rota has annulled marriages on account of the personality disorders of the said individuals.”
Article 36 is patterned after Church rules. As noted in Molina, “Since the purpose of including such provision in our Family Code is to harmonize our civil laws with the religious faith of our people, it stands to reason that to achieve such harmonization, great persuasive weight should be given to decisions of such appellate tribunal. Ideally — subject to our law on evidence — what is decreed as canonically invalid should also be decreed civilly void.”

5. Article 36 protects the family

The usual argument against Article 36, providing for psychological incapacity as a ground to declare the nullity of marriage, is that it weakens the family. On the contrary, as reiterated by the Supreme Court in Kalaw, Article 36 protects the institution of marriage. According to the Supreme Court, “the fulfillment 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.”
“Indeed, Article 36 of the Family Code, in classifying marriages contracted by a psychologically incapacitated person as a nullity, should be deemed as an implement of this constitutional protection of marriage. Given the avowed State interest in promoting marriage as the foundation of the family, which in turn serves as the foundation of the nation, there is a corresponding interest for the State to defend against marriages ill-equipped to promote family life. Void ab initio marriages under Article 36 do not further the initiatives of the State concerning marriage and family, as they promote wedlock among persons who, for reasons independent of their will, are not capacitated to understand or comply with the essential obligations of marriage.”
[Part 1 of 2]