Daily Serving of Legal Matters

Just today, a friend of mine sent me a message on whether his friend could marry a woman who is separated from her husband for 20 years. The woman is married.  This fact remains whether she was separated from her husband for 20 years.  Separation, be it legal or not, does not severe the marriage knot. Legal separation does not entitle any spouse to get married anew.  He/She is only separated from the board and lodging from his/her spouse.  The fact of their marriage is not erased. Moreso, if the couple is only separated in fact.  No matter how long the couple is separated from each other, their marriage remains. To marry the woman in this situation, the former marriage must have been annulled or declared null and void as the case may be. If the whereabouts of the husband cannot be known despite the effort of the wife, the latter may simply file a petition for presumptive death of the former in the proper court.  Once her husband is presumptively declared as...

A photo of the TV series The Legal Wife taken from google.com Since the local channel started airing the series The Legal Wife, a lot of viewers  have been glued to watch every episode of this series.  In fact the social media, like Facebook and Twitter, would be flooded with posts and comments written and interacted by its loyal viewers. In the said series, Monica, who is the legal wife of Adrian, caught her husband having an extra-marital affair with her best friend Nicole.  Based on the story, what would be the legal options for Monica if she would like to  fight in court? Option 1: Monica may file a criminal case of CONCUBINAGE.  This criminal case of concubinage shall be filed against both Adrian and Nicole.  Nicole is to be indicted with this crime also because she has full knowledge that Adrian is a married man before she had sexual intercourse with him. As what is stated in the Revised Penal Code: "Any husband who shall k...

As the title of this post says, not all marriages celebrated in the Philippines can be legally separated.  Only those that have the valid grounds provided in the Family Code of the Philippines can be petitioned for such. In my previous post Legal Separation Versus Declaration of Nullity/Annulment of Marriage ( http://dailyservingoflegalmatters.blogspot.com/2014/03/legal-separation-versus-declaration-of.html ), it was defined there what legal separation is and what does it entail. Again, legal separation does not severe the existence of a marriage bond.  The marriage ties do still exist but the husband and wife are separated in board and lodging.  Meaning, they are allowed to live on their own and mind their own separate lives.  Considering that the marriage exists, they are not allowed to remarry, otherwise, they may face criminal consequences. Grounds for Legal Separation: 1.  Repeated physical violence or grossly abusive conduct directed agai...

Considering that we have no DIVORCE in our country, we could not file any petition to that effect.  However, the Family Code of the Philippines provides instances on which the spouses may file an action in court when it comes to matters affecting their marriages. Specifically, the same Family Code discusses the grounds on which the contracting parties may invoke either for Declaration of Nullity or Annulment of Marriage or for Legal Separation as the case may be. In my previous posts, what were discussed are the grounds for declaration of nullity and the annulment of marriage. In this post, what would be discussed is the differences between legal separation and the declaration of nullity or annulment of marriage. 1.  In Legal Separation, the bond of marriage is not severed.  The spouses remain married to each other, however, they may be separated from bed and board.  While it permits the partial suspension of marital relations, the marriage bond sti...