THE Supreme Court (SC) has held that in cases of rape committed by force, threat or intimidation, it is not required to prove that the victim resisted the assault.

This was stressed by the SC’s Third Division in a 25-page ruling promulgated on June 26, 2024 which upheld the conviction of a father in Dagupan City accused of raping his daughter. The decision was penned by Associate Justice Maria Filomena Singh.

The accused, identified by the SC only as “ZZZ,” was charged with the rape and sexual abuse of her daughter “AAA” multiple times that started when she was nine years old until she was 16 years old

The Dagupan City Regional Trial Court convicted the accused on August 28, 2018, which the Court of Appeals affirmed on September 28, 2021.

In appealing his conviction, the accused cast doubt on the victim’s claim and said these were mere fabrications. He questioned why the victim did not resist the alleged rape.

He argued that “it goes against the grain of human experience for a woman who has been robbed of her honor and chastity not to seize an opportunity to escape from the clutches of her malefactor” or to resist.

He added that his daughter only accused him of rape because she was angry at him for being a “very strict father” who disciplined his children with an “iron fist.”

But the SC dismissed his plea to reverse the conviction and said that “it finds no reason to reverse the RTC and the CA’s conclusion that AAA’ s testimony is credible.”

The High Court held that AAA was able to “narrate in a clear and categorical manner” the repeated abuse that she was subjected to by her own father.

“AAA’s testimony is direct, consistent, sufficiently detailed, and withstood the questioning of both the defense and the RTC,” the SC said.

In upholding ZZZ’s conviction, the SC also resolved the issue of whether resistance is an element of rape.

To recall, under Article 266-A of the Revised Penal Code (RPC), there is rape when sexual intercourse is done through force, threat, or intimidation; when the victim is unconscious or deprived of reason; through fraud or abuse of authority; or when the victim is under 12 years old or is demented.

The SC ruled that in rape cases committed through force, threat, or intimidation, it is enough that such force, threat, or intimidation existed and was strong enough to prevent victims from asserting their will, determined from the victims’ perspective.

“The existence of such force, threat, or intimidation is determined from the perspective of the victim given, among other considerations, the circumstances of the rape, her relationship to the assailant, her state of mind, and the disparity in the assailant and the victim’s physical strength,” the SC explained.

In the instant case, which is a case of incestuous rape where the assailant is the father and the victim is his minor child, the SC said that “moral ascendancy or influence supplants the element of violence or intimidation.”

“A child simply cannot be expected to resist her own father’s abuse. The father-assailant’s dominance over the child-victim is complete in cases like this. Not only is the father physically superior as a grown male adult compared to a physically immature child, (but) he also asserts moral authority over the child. As children are raised and taught to obey their parents, it would be difficult for a child not to follow her own father’s orders, no matter how perverted,” it also said.

“This is particularly underscored in this case where AAA knows that her father is abusive and has even repeatedly beat her own mother. The fear in AAA’s mind was undoubtedly real and paralyzing,” it added.

Requiring proof of resistance, the SC pointed out, also “ignores the fact that women, as traditional victims of rape, have been conditioned to live for the male gaze and to believe that it is impolite to be assertive. It also dismisses the fact that resisting a man’s sexual advances can harm a woman or get her killed.”

“Rape is perhaps the only crime where the trial often focuses on the conduct of the victim instead of that of the accused. The need to prove lack of consent often becomes a question of the victim’s behavior, her history, and her conduct before, during, and after the rape as implying that some women can be ‘bad enough’ to be raped while others, because of their background, choices, and conduct, are simply lying when they claim that they were raped. It is time to strike down such uninformed and ignorant views,” the SC said.

Concurring with the decision are Associate Justices Alfredo Benjamin Caguioa, Samuel Gaerlan, Japar Dimaampao and Henri Jean Paul Inting.