Philippines – When abandonment becomes mental incapacity,

In Perez-Ferraris v. Ferraris (GR No. 162368, July 17, 2006), the Supreme Court affirmed the trial court’s dismissal of the wife’s motion for annulment of her marriage. The Supreme Court ruled that “the husband’s alleged mixed personality disorder, his ‘going out’ attitude whenever they argued, his violent tendencies during his epileptic seizures, his sexual infidelity, his abandonment and lack of support, and his preference for spending more time with his teammates than with his family are not rooted in any debilitating mental condition, but in a simple refusal or unwillingness to assume basic marital responsibilities.”

Almost eighteen years later, the Supreme Court faced a case that had almost a similar factual setting with Ferrari, but ruled differently. In De la Cruz-Lanuza v. Lanuza Jr. and Republic of the Philippines (GR No. 242362, April 17, 2024), the Supreme Court annulled the marriage on the grounds of the husband’s mental incapacity, manifested by “infidelity, lack of support for his wife and children, and unjustified absence from the family (which) indicates that he is not aware of the duties and responsibilities of a husband and father.”

Where is the difference? An analysis of the decisions reveals three significant differences between the Ferraris and Lanuza cases.

Unlike Lanuza, Ferraris was decided before the Tan-Andal v. Andal case (GR 196359, May 11, 2021) was announced, in which the Supreme Court changed the guidelines on how to establish mental incapacity as a ground for annulment of marriage. The Supreme Court emphasized that mental incapacity is a legal concept, not a strictly medical one. As such, mental incapacity does not have to be something that needs to be cured, and its root cause does not have to be clinically identifiable.

Instead, it is an incapacity that is so persistent and enduring in relation to a particular partner and contemplates a situation in which the personality structures of the couple are so incompatible that the only outcome of the relationship would be the irretrievable breakdown of the marriage. There must be clear and convincing evidence of persistent aspects of the person’s personality structure that manifest themselves through clear acts of dysfunction that undermine the family. The spouse’s personality structure must prevent him/her from understanding and complying with his/her marital obligations.

Applying Tan-Andal, the Supreme Court found in Lanuza’s case that the totality of the evidence presented showed that the husband did not understand and did not fulfill his duties. After their marriage in 1984, the husband did not provide food for the family because he returned home late after an evening spent with friends; he treated his wife like an ordinary resident of the house; and he engaged in illicit affairs.

After the husband left the family in 1994, the only time he visited the children was in 1999, when he showed up for an hour during a school appreciation day. The husband also had several marriages with different women, which led to him being charged with the crime of bigamy.

The Supreme Court ruled in this context that “an unjustified absence from the marital home for decades may be considered part of the body of evidence that the person is mentally incapable of fulfilling the essential obligations of marriage.”

Moreover, although both wives in the Ferraris and Lanuza cases decided to call a psychologist as an expert witness, only the psychologist in the Lanuza case was able to prove the credibility of his findings, because they were based not only on the wife’s own account (Ferraris case) but also on an interview he had conducted with the wife’s sister and the couple’s child.

More importantly, in contrast to the vague and ambiguous explanation in Ferraris, the psychologist in Lanuza was able to clearly and specifically establish all the elements of the psychological disability. The husband’s failure to acknowledge that he had responsibilities to his wife and children demonstrated the seriousness of his personality disorder. As for the previous legal findings, the psychologist explained that the husband’s personality disorder seemed to be fueled by the way he was raised by his family, as he was deprived of adequate parental supervision and the permissive attitude of his parents encouraged him to be extremely assertive, which is a manifestation of narcissistic personality disorder with underlying borderline personality traits.

Meanwhile, there is an incurability because people diagnosed with such a disorder steadfastly deny that they are mentally ill, reject the idea of ​​seeking professional help and therefore refuse any form of treatment.