Kinds of Aggravating Circumstances
- Generic
a. Apply generally to all crimes
b. Can be offset by an ordinary mitigating circumstance
c. Increase the penalty to the maximum period of penalty prescribed in the law provided alleged in the information as required under RRCP - Qualifying
a. Cannot be offset by any mitigating circumstance
b. Change the nature of the crime and designation of the offense
c. Must be alleged in the information
d. Must be proved as conclusively as the guilt of the offender
What are the aggravating circumstances? (first half)
- Abuse of official position
- Contempt or insult to public authorities
- Disregard of age, sex, or dwelling of the
offended party - Abuse of confidence and obvious
ungratefulness - Palace and places of commission of
offense - Nighttime, uninhabited place or band
- On occasion of calamity or misfortune
- Aid of armed men, etc.
- Recidivist
- Reiteracion or habituality
What are the aggravating circumstances? (second half)
- Price, reward, or promise
- By means of inundation, fire, etc.
- Evident premeditation
- Craft, fraud or disguise
- Superior strength or means to weaken
the defense - Treachery
- Ignominy
- Unlawful entry/ Breaking wall
- Aid of minor or by means of motor vehicle
or other similar means - Cruelty
Abuse of Official Position
To be considered aggravating, the public official must have used influence, prestige, and ascendancy which his office gives him in realizing his purpose. There must be an intimate connection between the offense and office of accused.
Insult to public authorities
Covers not only persons in authority but also agents of persons in authority and other public officers. To be considered, the public authority is engaged in the discharge of his duties and the offender knows that he is a public authority.
Age, sex, rank, dwelling
There must be proof that offender deliberately intended to offend or insult the offended with these four circumstances.
a. Rank - high social position. It should be clearly demonstrated that the accused deliberately intended to act with insult on account of his rank.
b. Sex - must be shown that the offender specially saw to it that the victim would be a woman.
c. Age - applies in cases where the victim is of tender
age or is of old age.
d. Dwelling - includes dependencies, staircase, and enclosures under the house. It must be a building or structure exclusively used for rest and comfort. The rationale for this is because it reveals the offender’s perversity in deliberately invading the tranquillity of one’s domicile. It is not aggravating if the offended has given provocation or if both parties live there.
Abuse of confidence/obvious ungratefulness
Requisites:
1. Offended party had trusted the offender.
2. Offender abused such trust by committing
a crime against offended party.
3. Abuse of confidence facilitated the
commission of the crime.
Palace of the Chief Executive, etc.
Requisites:
The crime be committed:
1. In the palace of the Chief Executive; or
2. In his presence; or
3. Where public authorities are engaged in
the discharge of their duties; or
4. In a place dedicated to religious worship.
Nightime/Nocturnity
Is the period of time after sunset to sunrise, from dusk to dawn.
Requisites:
1. It facilitated the commission of the crime
2. It especially sought for by the offender to
ensure the commission of the crime or for
the purpose of impunity
3. It facilitated the commission of the crime by insuring the offender’s immunity from capture
4. The place where the crime was committed was not illuminated.
Uninhabited place
Determined by the distance of the nearest house to the scene and WON in the place of the offense, there was a possibility of the victim receiving some help.
To be aggravating, it is necessary that the
offender took advantage of the place and purposely
availed of it as to make it easier to commit the
crime.
Band (cuadrilla)
Consists of:
a. More than 3 persons
b. Armed malefactors
c. Acting together in the commission of an offense
Calamity or misfortune
The crime is committed on the occasion of a
conflagration, shipwreck, earthquake, epidemic or
other calamity or misfortune.
Aid of Armed Men
Elements:
a. The armed men took part in the commission of crime indirectly/directly
b. Accused availed himself of their aid or relied upon them when the crime was committed.
Habituality
- Recidivism
- Reiteracion
- Habitual delinquency
- Quasi‐recidivism
Recidivist
One who at the time of his trial for one crime shall have been previously convicted by final judgment of another crime embraced in the same title of the RPC.
Reiteracion
Offender has been previously punished w/ an equal or greater penalty or two or more crimes w/ lighter penalty.
Habitual delinquency
Within a period of 10 years from his release or last conviction; of the crimes of falsification, robbery, estafa, theft, serious/less physical injuries, he is found guilty of said crimes a third time or oftener.
Quasi‐recidivism
special aggravating circumstance where a person, after having been convicted by final judgment, shall commit a new felony before beginning to serve such sentence, or while serving the same.
Price, promise reward
Requisites:
- There are at least two principals
a. Principal by inducement
b. Principal by direct participation - The price, reward, or promise should be
previous to and in consideration of the
commission of the criminal act.
Inundation, Fire
Aggravating - If the crime is committed by means of:
1. Inundation
2. Fire
3. Explosion
4. Stranding of the vessel or intentional
damage thereto
5. Derailment of locomotive; or
6. By use of any other artifice involving great
waste and ruin
if one of these circumstances was a means to kill, the crime is murder and no longer aggravating.
Evident premeditation
Elements:
a. The time when the offender determined to commit the crime
b. An act manifestly indicating that he has clung to his determination
c. Sufficient lapse of time between such determination and execution to allow him to reflect upon the consequences of his act.
Essence of evident premeditation
The execution of the criminal act must be
preceded by cool thought and reflection upon the
resolution to carry out the criminal intent during
the space of time sufficient to arrive at a calm
judgment.
Craft, fraud, disguise
- Craft – cunning/intellectual trickery or chicanery resorted to by the accused to carry out his evil design.
- Fraud – constitutes deceit and manifested by insidious words/machination
- Disguise - means resorting to any device to
conceal identity. If in spite of the
disguise, the offender was recognized, disguise
cannot be aggravating.
Abuse of superior strength
when the offenders intentionally and purposely employ excessive force out of proportion to the means of defense available to the offended party.
There must be evidence of notorious inequality of
forces between the offender and the offended
party in their age, size and strength, and that the
offender took advantage of such superior strength
in committing the crime.
