G.R. No. L-2228; February 28, 1950
THE PEOPLE OF THE PHILIPPINES, plaintiff-appellee, vs. FRUCTUOSO RABANDAN, defendant-appellant.

FACTS

The appellant, Fructuoso Rabandan, and the deceased, Florida Napala, were husband and wife. One night, appellant returned home and found his wife in bed with another man. The man escaped. Appellant scolded his wife and ordered her to leave the house. In response, she gathered her clothes, picked up a bolo from the kitchen, and attacked appellant, wounding him twice in the abdomen. Appellant wrestled the bolo from her and, during the struggle, stabbed her in the breast, causing her death that night. Appellant survived his serious wounds.

ISSUE

Whether the appellant acted in complete self-defense, thereby exempting him from criminal liability for the killing of his wife.

RULING

Yes. The Supreme Court reversed the trial court’s conviction for parricide and acquitted the appellant on the ground of complete self-defense. The Court found that the deceased committed unlawful aggression by attacking appellant with a bolo, causing serious wounds. There was no sufficient provocation on appellant’s part, as his act of scolding and ordering her to leave after discovering her infidelity was not unlawful. The means employed by appellant were reasonably necessary to repel the assault. The Court held that appellant, already seriously wounded and with the deceased still struggling to regain the bolo, was not obliged to discard the weapon and risk her retrieving it to continue the attack. The circumstances paralleled those in U.S. vs. Molina, where a defender’s right to repel danger until the aggression ceases was upheld. The benefit of Article 247 of the Revised Penal Code (which provides a privileged mitigating circumstance for a spouse who kills the other spouse and the paramour upon discovery in the act of sexual intercourse) was not applicable because appellant did not kill his wife immediately upon discovery.

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