Hilario and Herlita brought their 8-year old son, Hanz, to a hospital in Oroquieta City for an emergency appendectomy, where he was attended by Dr. Encarnacion Lumantas. After the procedure, the latter suggested to the parents that Hanz undergo circumcision, at no added cost to them. This the parents allowed. After the operation, Hanz complained of pain in his penis; it exhibited blisters, his testicles were swollen and he had urinated abnormally after his catheter was removed. He was discharged from the hospital over the objections of the parents, but was returned several days later after an abscess formation between the base and the shaft of his penis. He was referred to Dr. Henry Go, who discovered that Hanz’s urethra had been damaged. Despite several operations, his utrethra could not be fully repaired and reconstructed. Thus, the spouses filed a case for reckless imprudence resulting to serious physical injuries against Dr. Encarnacion.
After trial, the RTC acquitted Dr. Encarnacion, but ruled that Dr. Encarnacion was liable for moral damages because there was a preponderance of evidence showing that Hanz had received the injurious trauma from his circumcision by the petitioner.
Dr. Encarnacion appealed the decision to the CA, but the CA affirmed the RTC decision.
The Issue:
Whether or not petitioner may be held civilly liable even though he was acquitted in the criminal case.
The Ruling:
The petition for review lacks merit.
It is axiomatic that every person criminally liable for a felony is also civilly liable.Nevertheless, the acquittal of an accused of the crime charged does not necessarily extinguish his civil liability. In Manantan v. Court of Appeals, the Court elucidates on the two kinds of acquittal recognized by our law as well as on the different effects of acquittal on the civil liability of the accused, viz:
Our law recognizes two kinds of acquittal, with different effects on the civil liability of the accused. First is an acquittal on the ground that the accused is not the author of the act or omission complained of. This instance closes the door to civil liability, for a person who has been found to be not the perpetrator of any act or omission cannot and can never be held liable for such act or omission. There being no delict, civil liability ex delicto is out of the question, and the civil action, if any, which may be instituted must be based on grounds other than the delict complained of. This is the situation contemplated in Rule 111 of the Rules of Court. The second instance is an acquittal based on reasonable doubt on the guilt of the accused. In this case, even if the guilt of the accused has not been satisfactorily established, he is not exempt from civil liability which may be proved by preponderance of evidence only.
The Rules of Court requires that in case of an acquittal, the judgment shall state “whether the evidence of the prosecution absolutely failed to prove the guilt of the accused or merely failed to prove his guilt beyond reasonable doubt. In either case, the judgment shall determine if the act or omission from which the civil liability might arise did not exist.”
Conformably with the foregoing, therefore, the acquittal of an accused does not prevent a judgment from still being rendered against him on the civil aspect of the criminal case unless the court finds and declares that the fact from which the civil liability might arise did not exist.
Although it found the Prosecution’s evidence insufficient to sustain a judgment of conviction against the petitioner for the crime charged, the RTC did not err in determining and adjudging his civil liability for the same act complained of based on mere preponderance of evidence. In this connection, the Court reminds that the acquittal for insufficiency of the evidence did not require that the complainant’s recovery of civil liability should be through the institution of a separate civil action for that purpose.
The petitioner’s contention that he could not be held civilly liable because there was no proof of his negligence deserves scant consideration. The failure of the Prosecution to prove his criminal negligence with moral certainty did not forbid a finding against him that there was preponderant evidence of his negligence to hold him civilly liable. With the RTC and the CA both finding that Hanz had sustained the injurious trauma from the hands of the petitioner on the occasion of or incidental to the circumcision, and that the trauma could have been avoided, the Court must concur with their uniform findings. In that regard, the Court need not analyze and weigh again the evidence considered in the proceedings a quo. The Court, by virtue of its not being a trier of facts, should now accord the highest respect to the factual findings of the trial court as affirmed by the CA in the absence of a clear showing by the petitioner that such findings were tainted with arbitrariness, capriciousness or palpable error.
Every person is entitled to the physical integrity of his body. Although we have long advocated the view that any physical injury, like the loss or diminution of the use of any part of one’s body, is not equatable to a pecuniary loss, and is not susceptible of exact monetary estimation, civil damages should be assessed once that integrity has been violated. The assessment is but an imperfect estimation of the true value of one’s body. The usual practice is to award moral damages for the physical injuries sustained. In Hanz’s case, the undesirable outcome of the circumcision performed by the petitioner forced the young child to endure several other procedures on his penis in order to repair his damaged urethra. Surely, his physical and moral sufferings properly warranted the amount of P50,000.00 awarded as moral damages.
Many years have gone by since Hanz suffered the injury. Interest of 6% per annum should then be imposed on the award as a sincere means of adjusting the value of the award to a level that is not only reasonable but just and commensurate. Unless we make the adjustment in the permissible manner by prescribing legal interest on the award, his sufferings would be unduly compounded. For that purpose, the reckoning of interest should be from the filing of the criminal information on April 17, 1997, the making of the judicial demand for the liability of the petitioner.
WHEREFORE, the Court AFFIRMS the decision promulgated on February 23, 2003, with the modification that legal interest of 6% per annum to start from April 17, 1997 is imposed on the award of P50,000.00 as moral damages; and ORDERS the petitioner to pay the costs of suit.
SO ORDERED.
BERSAMIN, J.:
Sereno, C.J., Leonardo-De Castro, Villarama, Jr., and Reyes, JJ., concur.
G.R. no. 167753, January 15, 2014, DR. ENCARNACION C. LUMANTAS, M.D., PETITIONER, VS. HANZ CALAPIZ, REPRESENTED BY HIS PARENTS, HILARIO CALAPIZ, JR. AND HERLITA CALAPIZ, RESPONDENT.
Citations omitted.