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Here are select March 2013 rulings of the Supreme Court of the Philippines on criminal law and procedure:  1.REVISED PENAL CODE  Rape; medical examination of victim not indispensable to prove rape. An inconclusive medical report does not negate the finding that the accused (Penilla) raped AAA. A medical examination of the victim is not indispensable in a prosecution for rape inasmuch as the victim’s testimony alone, if credible, is sufficient to convict the accused of the crime. In fact, a doctor’s certificate is merely corroborative in character and not an indispensable requirement in proving the commission of rape. People of the Philippines v. Gilbert Penilla y Francia, G.R. No. 189324, March 20, 2013.

Rape; moral character of the victim is immaterial.  Accused Penilla’s insistence that he was then a virile young man of twenty-three years, lusted after by a separated and older woman, loses significance in light of the dictum that in rape cases, the moral character of the victim is immaterial. Rape may be committed not only against single women and children but also against those who are married, middle-aged, separated, or pregnant. Even a prostitute may be a victim of rape. Correlatively and more importantly, the libidinousness of the victim here, AAA, which is not accepted as a common attribute, should have been proven outside of the incident on the midnight of 22 October 1999.People of the Philippines v. Gilbert Penilla y Francia, G.R. No. 189324, March 20, 2013.

Rape; when absence of physical resistance unavailing as a defense. Accused-appellant makes much of the fact that AAA did not cry for help given that the area where they lived was densely populated, the houses thereat were literally only divided by thin walls, and any commotion could easily be heard. Penilla likewise points out that AAA did not put up a fight. In this regard, Penilla asseverates that...

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