SC clears mother of parricide, cites her mental illness
The Supreme Court has cleared a woman who was earlier convicted of parricide over the death of her own child in 2010, citing her mental disorder.
The high tribunal’s Third Division noted that the woman was clinically diagnosed with schizophrenia years after the incident, when she jumped off Manila’s Delpan Bridge into the Pasig River while carrying her 5-year-old daughter.
The court reversed the decision of the Manila Regional Trial Court (RTC) which found the woman guilty in 2020 and the Court of Appeals decision that upheld it in 2024.
Instead of releasing her from prison, however, the Supreme Court ordered her immediate transfer to the National Center for Mental Health (NCMH) in Mandaluyong City for treatment.
RTC to decide release
Her eventual release would be decided by the Manila RTC based on the recommendations of NCMH doctors, it said.
“The court is convinced that at the time of the incident, (the woman’s) mental state deprived her of the ability to appreciate the nature and wrongfulness of her act,” the high court said in a 14-page decision dated Oct. 29, 2025, and made public only on Monday.
The court defined schizophrenia “as a chronic mental disorder characterized by inability to distinguish between fantasy and reality, and often accompanied by hallucinations and delusions.”
People afflicted with this condition are deprived of discernment, it added.
‘She was not herself’
It cited the earlier testimony of the accused which, the court said, revealed her state of mind when asked why she was detained at the Manila City Jail: “Nakagawa ako ng kasalanan. (I committed a sin.)”
“She further testified that ‘she was not herself’ and ‘she was not in her right mind’,” the court recalled.
The court noted that what she confessed to was her suicide attempt in January 2010. She survived the jump and was rescued, but she lost hold of her daughter, whose body was found a day later.
In relieving her of criminal liability, the Supreme Court cited Article 12(1) of the Revised Penal Code, which considers insanity as a ground for exemption, unless the crime was committed during lucid moments.
‘Three-way test’
It also cited the 2020 Supreme Court decision on People v. Paña, which set a “three-way test” in determining insanity as an exempting circumstance.
“First, insanity must be present at the time of the commission of the crime; second, insanity, which is the primary cause of the criminal act, must be medically proven; and third, the effect of the insanity is the inability to appreciate the nature and quality or wrongfulness of the act,” the decision said, quoting jurisprudence.
Examinations conducted by NCMH doctors in 2013 and in 2018 confirmed that the woman was suffering from schizophrenia.
Despite the acquittal, the high tribunal found the mother still liable for civil damages.
She was ordered to pay a total of P275,000 in civil indemnity, moral, exemplary and temperate damages, at an interest rate of 6 percent per annum until full payment.
