ANNOTATION
 
ABERRATIO ICTUS
 
An Annotation on the case of People of the Philippines v.
Ronger Ringor Umawid, G.R. No. 208719, June 9, 2014,
725 SCRA 597
 
by
 
ALICIA GONZALEZ-DECANO, DCL, OP.*

 
___________________
 
§ I. Introduction, p. 619
§ II. Definition of Terms, p. 620
§ III. Discussion, p. 620
§ IV. Observation and Recommendation, p. 627
 
___________________
 
§ I. Introduction
 
There are times when one is overpowered by anger
because of the incurable harm done to him, hence the only
recourse is to vindicate himself by doing the same
dangerous incident that happened to him, but because of
the hunger for vengeance, his mind boggling hallucinations
to revenge to that someone who did wrong to him, in a bold
and hasty attack to avenge it fell to someone other than the
real person who

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*   Retired RTC Judge; Retired Dean of the College of Law Panpacific

University North Philippines, Urdaneta City; and Retired Program Lead,
UST Graduate School, Law Discipline.
  
 
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harmed him bitterly. In short, this is how aberratio ictus comes

in.
 
§ II. Definition of Terms
 
Insecurity – exists when there is a complete
deprivation of intelligence while committing the act i.e.,
where the accused is deprived of reason, he acts without
the least discernment because there is a complete absence
of power to discern, or there is total deprivation of freedom
of the will.
Treachery – there is treachery when the offender
commits any of the crime against the person, employing
means, methods or forms in the execution thereof which
tend directly and specially to insure its execution, without
risk to himself arising from the defense which the offended
party might make.
Delito compuesto – a compound crime where a single
act produces two or more grave or less grave felonies. It is a
complex crime in single terms.1
Aberratio Ictus  – “going astray of the blow.” There is
no mistake in such instances, but the consequences merely
turn out to be different than the accused expected.2
Dolus eventualis – means foreseeability of the accused
did not but he ought to have foreseen.
 
§ III. Discussion
 
The first part of this discussion refers to a foreign
setting while the second part refers to the case in
Philippine setting which is captioned in the title of this
article.

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1  People v. Umawid, G.R. No. 208719, June 9, 2014, 725 SCRA 597.
2  <https://www.studocu.com/en/document/university-of-the-
witwatersrand-johannesburg/criminal-law/lecture-notes/08-cr-aberratio-
ictus/4195705/view>.

 
 

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The aberratio ictus rule derives from two 1949 cases (RV
Kuzwayo and RV Koza) which cited an example of a
situation or an example of a case in this manner: A had
intention to kill C but killed B. A is guilty of murder
without the prosecution having to prove specific intention
with regard to B.3 (Underlining supplied)
In the example given above, there are two approaches to
this defense namely: Transferred Intent/Policy Approach
and Concrete/Principled Approach.
The first approach is explained in this manner:

(1)  TRANSFERRED INTENT/POLICY APPROACH  –

Is exemplified in the following manner: (a) transferring the
accused’s intent to kill/harm one person to apply in respect
of the person actually killed; (b) there is never a prospect for
the accused to be acquitted and it encourages  versari in re
illicita; (c) the accused will be liable for an unintended
victim’s murder according to the generalized approach to 
mens rea. Murder consists of the unlawful, intentional
killing a human being but the fact that the actual victim
deflected from the unintended victim ought not to afford a
defense. In the eyes of the accused he intended to kill the
actual victim.4 (Underlining supplied)
The literature on transferred intent distinguishes two kinds
of situations in which the wrong victim suffers harm at the
hands of the accused. The first, sometimes called error in 
objectio  which involves a mistake by the perpetrator as to
the identity of the victim. A gunman aims at and shoots a
pedestrian on the street; the assailant thought the
pedestrian was X, but in fact he is Y. There is little
controversy that these sort of mistake as to the identity of
the victim in no way affects the fact that 

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3  Id.
4  Id.
  
 
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the perpetrator has committed an intentional crime.5

(Underlining supplied)
The second wrong victim situation, sometimes called  ab
erratio ictus, or more poetically, a mistake of the bullet that
has led to the controversy surrounding the  doctrine of
transferred intent. In the second situation, the perpetrator
aims at X but by chance or lack of skill hits Y. The
appropriateness of assessing criminal liability as though the
bullet had found its intended mark depends heavily upon
one’s evaluation of the importance of the identity of the
victim as an element of the offense in question.”6
 (Underlining supplied)
(2)  CONCRETE/PRINCIPLED APPROACH – It is called the 
principled approach  because it follows the  principles of criminal
liability. It can only be accepted that the accused intended to kill
the unintended victim if it can be demonstrated or proved that the
accused knew his blow could (possibly) strike the unintended
victim (foreseeability — dolus eventualis, or if he did not, he ought
to have foreseen. One merely applies the ordinary principles
violating the intention, especially  dolus eventualis. If the accused
lacked intention with respect to the unintended victim’s death, he
cannot be convicted of murder and this intention to kill the
intended victim cannot be used as a substitute for the actual
victim. If the accused did not foresee but ought to have foreseen
then he is guilty of culpable homicide. It is not an abstract
intention but concrete and tangible. This approach derives support
from Holmes JA in S v. Mtshiza.7 (Underlining supplied)

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5  <www.duhaime.org/LegalDictionary/A/AberratioIctus.aspx>,
DROSTE v. R, (1984) 1 S.C.R. 208.
6   Id. (Mayrand, A., Dictionnaire de maximes et locutions latines
utilisées en droit) [Montereal: Editions Yvon Blais, 2007].
7  Supra note 2.

 
 
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a. Cases of Concrete Principle Approach (Two [2])

Local Decisions in a Foreign Court
 
1.  CASE: S v. Mtshiza, 1970, AD

•  Facts: M and P consumed large quantities of liquor

then quarreled. P was much larger than M so he provoked
him whereupon M (the accused) produced a pocket knife
and tried to stab P. W, a friend of M, tried to intervene but
he was stabbed and died.
•  Court held: The trial court convicted the accused of
culpable homicide. On appeal, Holmes JA (minority)
followed the concrete approach while the majority felt it was
unnecessary to consider aberratio ictus on the facts.
However, Holmes’ approach was that the transferred
approach was no longer applicable because aberratio ictus
was no more than “a convenient Latin expression
descriptive of the situation where a blow aimed at A misses
him and lands on B” and Koza and Kuzwayo were decided
before the Court had abandoned the versari doctrine and
formulated the principles of dolus eventualis.
He made noteworthy points that aberratio ictus should
be judged as follows:
1)  The accused will almost always be guilty of
attempted murder (with respect to intended victim)
2)  With regard to the actual victim, there are three
possibilities:
a)  If it was foreseen that the unintended victim
would be struck and reconciled himself to that, there
would be dolus eventualis and the accused would be
convicted of murder;
b)  If it was not foreseen but ought to have been
foreseen, then there would be a conviction of culpable
homicide;
c)  If dolus eventualis and culpable homicide did not
exist then the accused would be acquitted.

 
 
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2.  Holmes JA explained aberratio ictus in an obiter.

Since then, there have been two provincial decisions
utilizing the concrete approach. (Underlining supplied)

 
b. Cases of Concrete/
Principled Approach
(National level) in a
foreign country.
 
1.  CASE: S v. Tissen, 1979, TPD

•  Facts: The appellant was charged with common

assault and attempt to murder because in shooting at one
person the bullet had ricocheted off the street and struck
and injured another person. In an appeal against the
attempted murder conviction it was held that in shooting at
a person in a crowded street the accused must have foreseen
the possibility of injuring some person other than the
intended victim and had been reckless as to whether the
injury resulted or not and thus had committed a crime.
•  Court held: Applied concrete approach and Margo J
said “here the appellant, in shooting at his intended victim
in a crowded street. . . must have been foreseen subjectively
the possibility of killing or injuring some person other than
the intended victim and he was reckless as to whether
death or injury resulted or not.”

 
2.  CASE: S v. Raisa, 1979, OPD

•  Facts: The accused tried to stab a woman who warded

off the blow by holding her child up in front of her and as
the result the accused stabbed and injured the child.
Thereafter he succeeded in stabbing the woman. He pleaded
guilty to two counts of assault with intent to do grievous
bodily harm and was convicted. However, it appeared that
the accused had not admitted intent to assault the child. On
review the court confirmed the convic-

 
 

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ction of assault of the child and it was held that the accused
could have been found guilty on that count only if he
admitted intent to assault the child or if such intent had
been proved.
•  Court held: Court set aside the conviction on this
count.8

 
Distinction Between Error in Objectio and 
Aberratio Ictus9
 
The two concepts must be distinguished:

•  Error in objectio  occurs where A, intending to kill B,

shoots and kills C whom he mistakenly believes to be B. In
such instances A is clearly guilty of murder of C.
•  A’s intention is directed at “a specific predetermined
individual although he is in error as to the exact identity of
that individual.” He intends to kill the individual regardless
of whether it is B or C.
•  An undeflected mens rea falls upon the person it was
intended to affect an error as to identity is thus irrelevant
to the question of mens rea.
•  Aberratio ictus: A intends to kill B but misses him
and kills C.
•  A’s intention is directed at one whom he knows and
recognizes to be B. It is unforeseen and unintended factors
that the blow falls upon C.
•  A has intention in respect of C only if he foresaw the
possibility of C’s death or if the death was reasonably
foreseeable.

 
Let us now turn to the case under annotation.

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8  Id., at pp. 2-3.

9  Id., at p. 4.

 
 

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In the case of People v. Umawid, the Supreme Court in
relation to Aberratio Ictus, ruled:

“The Supreme Court (SC) observes that Maureen’s death

is a case of aberratio ictus, given that the fatal blow therefor
was only delivered by mistake as it was actually Vicente
who was Umawid’s intended target. In this regard,
Umawid’s single deed actually resulted in the: (a)
attempted murder of Vicente, and (b) consummated murder
of Maureen. This may be classified as species of complex
crime defined under Article 48 of the RPC, particularly, a
delito compuesto, or a compound crime where a single act
produces two (2) or more grave or less grave felonies. Based
on the foregoing, Umawid should have been punished for
committing the complex crime of murder and attempted
murder, pursuant to Article 48 in relation to Article 4(1) of
the RPC. However, considering that the information in
Criminal Case No. 23-0471 only charged him with the
murder of Maureen, Umawid cannot be convicted of a
complex crime because to do so would be violative of his
right to due process.”

 
The Supreme Court cited the case of Burgos v.
Sandiganbayan.10 The decision runs this wise:

“In criminal cases where the life and liberty of the

accused is at stake, due process requires that the accused be
informed of the nature and causes of the accusation against
him. An accused cannot be convicted of an offense unless it
is clearly charged in the complaint or information. To
convict him of an offense other than that charged in the
complaint or information would be a violation of this
constitutional right.”

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10  G.R. No. 133144, October 15, 2003, 413 SCRA 385.

 
 

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§ IV. Observation and Recommendation

 
Any person should exercise due care and caution in
everything that he does especially so if the act he intends to
commit means the loss of one’s father, brother, son, or any
member of the opponent’s family. It is but proper these
times that our days are numbered. We go out of this
mundane world not at the same time — except due to war
where almost all will be killed and murdered without our
own control. Let us wait the call of our Creator because
only He can determine when our end will come. Vengeance
is not ours, it is God’s.
 
——o0o——

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