‘Rapist’ father gets life imprisonment
The Supreme Court has recently affirmed the decision of a lower court sentencing a father to life imprisonment without the possibility of parole for allegedly raping his two daughters.
Daily TribuneThe Supreme Court has recently affirmed the decision of a lower court sentencing a father to life imprisonment without the possibility of parole for allegedly raping his two daughters.
It also upheld the P300,000 damages in each of the three qualified statutory rape cases imposed on the father who sexually abused his two minor daughters in 2015.
This comes after the father — whose identity was withheld — petition to the Supreme Court to reverse the ruling of the trial court which was also affirmed by the Court of Appeals.
The accused said that he should be acquitted because of the "inconsistencies" in the testimonies of his two daughters — one was only 11 years old and the other 14 years old at the time of the commission of the crimes.
In his petition to reverse the sentence against him, he also claimed that his children should have shouted or sought help from her other siblings who were sleeping in the same room, and in the case of the 14-year-old daughter who was raped twice, she should have avoided to be alone with him in their house.
The sexual abuses were discovered when one of the minor children told their elder sibling who sought the assistance of barangay officials which led to the charges of rape wherein the two victims testified in court, including their elder sister.
The trial court convicted the father and was affirmed by the Court of Appeals, which lead to the filing of an appeal to the SC.
In the decision written by Associate Justice Ramon Paul L. Hernando, the SC — citing previous rulings — declared that the individual differences dictate that there is no singular response when a person encounters a certain situation, especially when involving an extremely traumatic experience such as rape committed by one's own father.
"Yet, a child victim should not be judged based on the course of action taken even when it is the opposite of the normal behavior of a mature individual. Hence, the father cannot fault the 14-year-old daughter for keeping her silence while she was being defiled, especially so when it was brought about by fear or an otherwise overwhelming emotion of helplessness," said the SC ruling.
"The rape victim's actions are oftentimes influenced by fear rather than by reason. The perpetrator of the rape hopes to build a climate of extreme psychological terror, which would numb the victim into silence and submissiveness," it added.
The SC ruling also stressed that "incestuous rape further magnifies this terror, for the perpetrator in these cases, such as the victim's father, is a person normally expected to give solace and protection to the victim."
"Moreover, in incest, access to the victim is guaranteed by the blood relationship, magnifying the sense of helplessness and the degree of fear," it added.