II.

Laws on Sex Crimes in the Philippines

a. Revised Penal Code and its amendments

Enacted in 1930, the Revised Penal Code (RPC) or Republic Act 3815, contains the
general criminal laws of the Philippines. Among those contained are provisions on rape
and acts of lasciviousness found in Chapter two (2) of Title eleven (11) under article 335
and 336 respectively.

Originally, both felonies were considered as crimes against chastity, however, with the
passage of Republic Act No. 8853 or the Anti-Rape Law of 1997, rape was reclassified
as crimes against persons. According to Masigan (2019), the difference provided by the
reclassification lies in the privateness of the crime. To elaborate, the original
classification as against chastity, considered rape as a crime to the same extent as
concubinage and adultery consisting of a lighter punishment as well as the requirement
that the victim themself must be the one to initiate the complaint before the courts. With
the reclassification to crimes against persons however, placed rape in the same light as
homicide and kidnapping. Hence, the penalty was also increased into reclusion perpetua
following the abolition of death penalty in 2006 under Republic Act No. 9346. Moreover,
the scope of rape was expanded by the same act to cover “an act of sexual assault by
inserting his penis into other person's mouth or anal orifice, or any instrument or object,
into the genital or anal orifice of another person."

The case of People of the Philippines vs. Salvador Tulagan applied this rule and
highlighted the difference between a crime of chastity and a crime against persons when
the Court stated that:
The Congress merely upgraded the same from a "crime against chastity" (a
private crime) to a "crime against persons" (a public crime) as a matter of policy
and public interest in order to allow prosecution of such cases even without the
complaint of the offended party, and to prevent extinguishment of criminal liability
in such cases through express pardon by the offended party.

Another amendment happened on March 4, 2022, when former President Rodrigo

Duterte signed a bill raising the age of sexual consent from 12 to 16 thus creating
Republic Act No. 11648 (Parrocha, 2022). The increase aimed to provide further
protection towards young people against exploitation for sexual gains.

b. Republic Act No. 7877 or The Anti-Sexual Harassment Act of 1995 as amended by
Republic Act No. 11313 or the Safe Spaces Act of 2019
Under R.A. 7877 or The Anti-Sexual Harassment Act of 1995, the legislators only
penalized sexual harassment at work, training, or education committed by an employer,
employee, manager, supervisor, agent of the employer, teacher, instructor, professor,
coach, trainor, or any other person who has authority, influence, or moral superiority over
the victim. It aims to compel the employer or the head of the work-related, educational or
training environment or institution, to prevent or deter sexual harassment cases and to
lay down the procedures for the resolution, settlement or prosecution of sexual
 harassment acts. Unfortunately, the law did not cover sexual harassment committed by
subordinates or peers, and any other persons outside the context of work, training, and
education (Atty. Librado-Trinindad, 2021).

In the case of Bacsin v. Wahiman (2008), a public school teacher was dismissed from
service for violating R.A. 78777 or The Anti-Sexual Harassment Act of 1995. The victim,
a minor student of the said teacher, claimed that the teacher called her to his office
where he molested her on various occasions. In another case of Atty. Co Untian, Jr.
(2019), the Court disbarred him from law practice for ten years due to the commission of
acts of sexual harassment against some of his students.

Decades after, sexual harassment remains prevalent, hence, R.A. 11313 or the Safe
Spaces Act of 2019 was passed in recognition that power is not only composed of
authority and social status but gender relations as well (Atty. Librado-Trinindad, 2021).

The Safe Spaces Act of 2019, otherwise known as Bawal Bastos Law, expanded the
concept of sexual harassment was expanded. The requirement that the offender must
have authority, power, social status, and position is no longer material. Therefore,
anyone can be an offender. In addition, sexual harassment is no longer enclosed in
work, training, and education. Sexual harassment under this law may now be committed
in all spaces - physical and online.

In this act, sexual harassment is categorized into three forms:

i) Gender-Based Sexual Harassment in Streets and Public Spaces;
ii) Gender-Based Online Sexual Harassment; and
iii) Gender-Based Sexual Harassment in the Workplace, Educational and Training
Institutions (Gonzales, 2023).

Moreover, the Safe Spaces Act provided for the duties of LGUs to promulgate localized
anti-sexual harassment laws.

c. Local Legislations
As the number of sexual harassment cases in public spaces increase, densely
populated cities, like Quezon City and Manila, established penalties to dampen the
numbers even prior to the Safe Spaces Act. (Gonzales, 2023).

In 2015, Quezon City passed the Gender and Development Code of Quezon City to
establish penalties for sexual harassment in public spaces. Subsequently, in 2018, the
City of Manila, in partnership with the Institute of Politics and Governance and UN
Women, created and endorsed the Safe City for Women and Girls Ordinance to prevent
and respond to sexual harassment in public spaces which includes catcalling, wolf-
whistling, cursing, and stalking, among others. However, it took some time before other
local government units (LGUs) followed suit. Only In 2022, did General Santos
City( Gubalani, 2022), and Malolos City (City Government of Malolos, 2022) promulgate
 its own anti-sexual harassment law based on the safe spaces act. While the cities of
Bacolod (Bacolod City government, 2023), Batangas (Batangas City government, 2023),
Naga (Naga City government, 2023), Mandaluyong (Yalao, 2023), and others enacted
their own in the year of 2023.

d. Republic Act No. 9262 or Violence Against Women and Children (VAWC)
RA 9262 is the Anti-Violence Against Women and their Children Act of 2004 which seeks
to address the prevalence of violence and abuses against women and children. Under
the law, violence against women and children refers to ““any act or a series of acts
committed by any person against a woman who is his wife, former wife, or against a
woman with whom the person has or had a sexual or dating relationship, or with whom
he has a common child, or against her child whether legitimate or illegitimate, within or
without the family abode, which result in or is likely to result in physical, sexual,
psychological harm or suffering, or economic abuse including threats of such acts,
battery, assault, coercion, harassment or arbitrary deprivation of liberty” (Office of the
Ombudsman, n.d.).

However, anent the promulgation of VAWC, rape remains a widespread crime in the
Philippines (Gutierrez, 2024). Statistics documents that it is the most frequently
reoccurring crimes spanning in the timeframe of July 2022 to January 7, 2023.
Additionally, the Philippine Commission on Women (PCW) also provided the statistics
that one in 20 girls and women aged 15 to 49 years old has experienced such violence
at some point in their lifetime.

Given the foregoing, Ancheta (2018) acknowledged that there are laws that capture experiences
of street harassment, these laws were deemed insufficient because they failed to address street
harassment as a gender-based type of abuse or harassment.

References:
Revised Penal Code
Anti-Rape Law of 1997

[ G.R. No. 227363, March 12, 2019 ]

PEOPLE OF THE PHILIPPINES, PLAINTIFF-APPELLEE, VS. SALVADOR TULAGAN,
ACCUSED-APPELLANT.

[ REPUBLIC ACT NO. 11648, March 04, 2022 ]

AN ACT PROMOTING FOR STRONGER PROTECTION AGAINST RAPE AND
SEXUAL EXPLOITATION AND ABUSE, INCREASING THE AGE FOR DETERMINING
THE COMMISSION OF STATUTORY RAPE, AMENDING FOR THE PURPOSE ACT
NO. 3815, AS AMENDED, OTHERWISE KNOWN AS "THE REVISED PENAL CODE,"
REPUBLIC ACT NO. 8353, ALSO KNOWN AS "THE ANTI-RAPE LAW OF 1997," AND
REPUBLIC ACT NO. 7610, AS AMENDED, OTHERWISE KNOWN AS THE "SPECIAL
PROTECTION OF CHILDREN AGAINST ABUSE, EXPLOITATION AND
DISCRIMINATION ACT"