Converting to Islam for second marriage, that’s bigamy

Conversion of religion to Islam is not valid grounds to have second spouse if there is no
dissolution of the first marriage.
A party to a civil marriage who converts to Islam and contracts another marriage,
despite the first marriage 's subsistence, is guilty of bigamy. Likewise guilty is the
spouse in the subsequent marriage. Conversion to Islam does not operate to exculpate
them from criminal liability.
The court made the ruling on March 21 while sentencing a couple to six years in jail
after they converted to Islam and married despite the husband already having a wife
and children in Davao province in the southern Mindanao region.
It was the first time such a case had been brought before the country’s top court.
The petitioners claimed they could not be penalized for bigamy as they converted to
Islam prior to their marriage. They argued that the Muslim Code – and not the general
law, or the Civil Code – applies in their case.
But the Supreme Court pointed out that while Islamic law allows polygamy, it only does
so in "exceptional cases," in particular, if the Muslim men “can deal with [their wives]
with equal companionship and just treatment.”
It added that the Muslim Code is not applicable in the said case since the first wife is a
non-Muslim. However, the SC held that Article 13 (2) of the Muslim Code explicitly
spells out that the Civil Code governs marriages where either party is non-Muslim and
which were not solemnized in Muslim rites.
“There is no conflict with general law here. The nature, consequences, and incidents of
petitioner Francis’ prior and admittedly subsisting marriage to Nerrian remain well within
the ambit of the Civil Code, and its counterpart penal provisions in the Revised Penal
Code,” the SC explained.
The SC stated: “Whether petitioner Francis converted to Islam before or after his
marriage with petitioner Jacqueline, the subsequent marriage consummated the crime
of bigamy. He cannot successfully invoke the exculpatory clause in Article 180 [of the
Muslim Code], considering that the Muslim Code finds no application in his then
subsisting marriage with Nerrian, the marriage recognized by law that bars and
penalizes a subsequent marriage.”
Petitioners' apparent nonchalance in complying with the Muslim Code is an evidentiary
matter where the Regional Trial Court and the Court of Appeals' findings are in
complete harmony. Factual matters are not the province of the present Petition. Absent
any showing that they are grossly in error, the findings of the Regional Trial Court and
the Court of Appeals stand undisturbed.