a. Absorption Principle

Rules for application of qualifying circumstances

• Murder will exist with only one of the circumstances; others must be considered as generic aggravating. However, when other circumstances are absorbed or included in one qualifying circumstance, they cannot be considered as generic aggravating circumstances.
• Any of the circumstances must be alleged in order to qualify the crime to murder. (Secs. 8 and 9, Rule 110 of the Rules of Court)

Absorption of ordinary crimes performed for and during a rebellion (Political Offense Doctrine)

• People v. Hernandez: Rebellion cannot be complexed with ordinary (common) crimes done pursuant to it. (G.R. Nos. L-6025-26).
• People v. Geronimo: Crimes done for private purposes without political motivation should be separately punished. (G.R. No. L-8936).
• Enrile v. Salazar: Hernandez ruling remains binding doctrine, operating to prohibit the complexing of rebellion with any other offense committed on the occasion thereof, either as a means to its commission or as an unintended effect of any activity that constitutes rebellion. (G.R. No. 92164).

Common crimes done in pursuance of rebellious purpose

If other common crimes were done in pursuance of the rebellious purpose, these crimes are absorbed and the person is liable only for rebellion.

Absorption not automatic

Absorption is not automatic. One has to show that common crimes were done pursuant to rebellious purposes, even if one was a member of a rebellious group.

“Unless the homicide committed should deserve a higher penalty”

When homicide is committed with a qualifying circumstance, then a higher penalty shall be imposed (e.g., for murder or parricide).

Distinctions (People v. Villanueva, C.A.- G.R. No. 2676):

• Art 294 applies if the offense committed is consummated robbery with homicide.
• Art 297 applies if the offense committed is attempted or frustrated robbery with homicide.
• Art 48 applies if the offense committed is attempted or frustrated robbery with only serious physical injuries being also inflicted, provided serious physical injuries must be employed as the necessary means of committing the robbery.

If only physical injuries were inflicted on the victim, but no intent to kill was proven and the victim did not die, the liability of the offender may be as follows:

• If physical injuries were inflicted as a means for the commission of Attempted or Frustrated Robbery, the injuries are absorbed. The crime shall only be attempted or frustrated robbery.
• If physical injuries were inflicted on the occasion of the robbery but not as a means for the commission of attempted or frustrated robbery, they are treated as separate crimes of Attempted or Frustrated robbery and Physical Injuries.
• If both killing and physical injuries were committed on the occasion of the robbery, the crime shall be penalized in accordance with Art. 297 but the physical injuries will be absorbed.

Art 298. Execution of Deeds By Means of Violence or Intimidation

Any person who, with intent to defraud another, by means of violence or intimidation, shall compel him to sign, execute or deliver any public instrument or document

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Overt act as element of rebellion

An overt act alleged as part of rebellion is absorbed when it was committed in furtherance of the rebellious purpose. A common crime committed for a private purpose is not absorbed merely because it was alleged or the offender was a rebel.

Membership in rebel organizations

Membership in a rebel organization does not automatically qualify as a criminal act absorbed in rebellion. It must be conclusively demonstrated that criminal acts were committed in furtherance of rebellion. (People v Lovedioro, GR No. 112235)

Treason cannot be complexed with other crimes

There is no complex crime of treason with murder or physical injuries. (People v. Prieto 80 Phil. 138) This is because, when the deed is charged as an element of treason, it becomes identified with the latter crime and cannot be the subject of a separate punishment, or used in combination with treason to increase the penalty which Art. 48 of the RPC provides. (People v Hernandez, GR No. L-6025)

Distinguished from rape

• Whether rape occurred depends on proof of its statutory elements, not on whether the victim resisted tenaciously. If abduction is also proved, determine its treatment according to the offender’s objective and the acts committed.
• Rape may absorb forcible abduction if the main objective was to rape the victim.

Forcible abduction with rape

The facts show that after raping the victim, the offender continued to detain her and refused to release her. Thus, although the initial abduction may have been absorbed by the crime of rape, the continued detention after the rape cannot be deemed absorbed in it. Likewise, since the detention continued after the rape had been completed, it cannot be deemed a necessary means for the crime of rape. (People v. Concepcion, G.R. No. 214886)

Theft and Robbery, Distinguished

Crime absorbs grave coercion

Crime of expulsion absorbs grave coercion. If done by a private person, act will amount to Grave Coercion.

When both Nighttime and Treachery are present

• General Rule: Nighttime is absorbed in treachery.
• Exception: Where both the treacherous mode of attack and nocturnity were deliberately decided upon in the same case, they can be considered separately if such circumstances have different factual bases.

The present crime and the previous crime must be "embraced in the same title of this Code."

When one offense is punishable by an ordinance or special law and the other by the Revised Penal Code, the two offenses are not embraced in the same title of the Code. (Id)

Actual design to kill a person

When the crime intended to be committed is arson and somebody dies as a result thereof, the crime is simply arson and the act resulting in the death of that person is not even an independent crime of homicide, it being absorbed. (People vs. Paterno, et al., 85 Phil. 722)

If the offender had the intent to kill the victim, burned the house where the latter was, and the victim died as a consequence, the crime is murder, qualified by the circumstance that the crime was committed "by means of fire." (See Art. 248)

Craft and fraud may be absorbed in treachery if it is deliberately adopted as the means, method or form for the treacherous strategy.

It may co-exist independently from treachery only when both circumstances are adopted for different purposes in the commission of the crime. (People v. Lab-eo, G.R. No. 133438)

Where the accused pretended to hire the driver in order to get his vehicle, it was held that there was craft directed to the theft of the vehicle, separate from the means subsequently used to treacherously kill the defenseless driver. (People v. San Pedro, G.R. No. L-44274)

That the victim is a woman is inherent in parricide

In parricide, abuse of superior strength must be established by facts showing that the offender deliberately took advantage of a marked disparity in strength; it is not presumed merely because the offender is the victim’s husband. (Reyes, Book I)

Superior strength is absorbed and inherent in treachery. (People v Mobe, G.R No. L-1292)