By Benjamin Cuaresma
MANILA — Marital infidelity by itself is not punishable under the Anti-Violence Against Women and Their Children Act, but it may constitute psychological violence when it is proven to have caused mental or emotional suffering to the wife, the Supreme Court has ruled.
In a Decision penned by Associate Justice Amy C. Lazaro-Javier, the Court’s Second Division affirmed the conviction of a husband under Section 5(i) of Republic Act No. 9262, or the Anti-VAWC Act of 2004.
The Court stressed that the law does not punish adultery or infidelity itself. What it penalizes is psychological violence that results in proven mental or emotional anguish.
The couple married in 1999 and had two children. Their marriage began to deteriorate in 2009 after the husband started coming home late and became increasingly distant from his family.
In January 2010, he sent his wife text messages saying he would no longer return home, wanted to begin a new life on his own and intended to seek the nullity of their marriage.
The wife later discovered that her husband was living with another woman.
Her brother and a private investigator monitored the husband and observed him repeatedly leaving and returning to the same house with the other woman. Other witnesses likewise informed the wife about the relationship.
The husband was subsequently charged with psychological violence before the Regional Trial Court.
During the trial, the wife testified that her husband’s abandonment and relationship with another woman caused severe mental and emotional suffering, including loss of self-esteem and dignity.
She also said she experienced depression and attempted to take her own life several times.
A psychologist who evaluated her found signs of depression, including feelings of inferiority, sleeping difficulties, poor concentration and problems relating to others.
The psychologist linked these difficulties to the marital conflict and the husband’s abandonment of the family for another woman.
Their son also testified that he saw his mother crying and depressed for more than two years after his father left.
Both the RTC and the Court of Appeals found the husband guilty.
The Supreme Court upheld the conviction, emphasizing that an extramarital relationship does not automatically amount to psychological violence.
The Court said infidelity may be one of the acts through which psychological violence is committed, but the prosecution must still establish that the act actually caused mental or emotional suffering.
In this case, the Court found the wife’s testimony, the psychological evaluation and the accounts of other witnesses sufficient to establish the harm she suffered.
“All these pieces of evidence vividly paint a single picture: the intense and unbearable pain that [the wife] contended with for years as a result of [her husband’s] abandonment and infidelity,” the Court said.
The ruling also rejected the husband’s argument that his acquittal in a separate concubinage case should absolve him under the Anti-VAWC Act.
The Court explained that concubinage and psychological violence under RA 9262 are distinct offenses, with different elements and legal requirements.
The husband was sentenced to imprisonment of up to eight years and ordered to pay a P100,000 fine and P30,000 in moral damages to his wife.
He was likewise directed to undergo mandatory psychological counseling or psychiatric treatment.
Senior Associate Justice Marvic M.V.F. Leonen dissented.
While agreeing that infidelity alone does not constitute psychological violence under RA 9262, Leonen maintained that the prosecution failed to establish that the husband deliberately inflicted mental or emotional anguish on his wife.
He therefore found the evidence insufficient to sustain the conviction.
The ruling was issued in G.R. No. 268619 (XXX v. People), Jan. 13, 2026.
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