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G.R. No. L-16439 July 20, 1961 ANTONIO GELUZ, Petitioner, vs. The Hon. Court of Appeals and Oscar Lazo, Respondents. Facts

This case involved three abortions performed by Antonio Geluz on Nita Villanueva. Oscar Lazo, Nita's husband, sued Geluz for damages from the third abortion. The Court of Appeals affirmed damages of P3,000 against Geluz. The issue was whether an unborn child has legal personality such that its parents can recover damages for injury to the unborn child. The Supreme Court ruled that personality begins at conception, but the child must be born alive for legal personality. Since the child died in the third abortion, it never acquired legal personality and the parents could not recover damages for injury to the child, but only for direct damages to themselves.

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Jennica Gyrl G. Delfin
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68 views1 page

G.R. No. L-16439 July 20, 1961 ANTONIO GELUZ, Petitioner, vs. The Hon. Court of Appeals and Oscar Lazo, Respondents. Facts

This case involved three abortions performed by Antonio Geluz on Nita Villanueva. Oscar Lazo, Nita's husband, sued Geluz for damages from the third abortion. The Court of Appeals affirmed damages of P3,000 against Geluz. The issue was whether an unborn child has legal personality such that its parents can recover damages for injury to the unborn child. The Supreme Court ruled that personality begins at conception, but the child must be born alive for legal personality. Since the child died in the third abortion, it never acquired legal personality and the parents could not recover damages for injury to the child, but only for direct damages to themselves.

Uploaded by

Jennica Gyrl G. Delfin
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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G.R. No.

L-16439 July 20, 1961

ANTONIO GELUZ, petitioner,


vs.
THE HON. COURT OF APPEALS and OSCAR LAZO, respondents.

FACTS:

Her present husband impregnated Nita Villanueva before they were legally married. Desiring to conceal
her pregnancy from the parent, she had herself aborted by petitioner Antonio Geluz. After her marriage,
she again became pregnant. As she was then employed in the COMELEC and her pregnancy proved to
be inconvenient, she had herself aborted again by Geluz. Less than 2 years later, Nita incurred a third
abortion of a two-month old fetus, in consideration of the sum of P50.00. Her husband did not know of,
nor consented to the abortion. Hence Oscar Lazo, private respondent, sued petitioner for damages based
on the third and last abortion.
The trial court rendered judgment ordering Antonio Geluz to pay P3,000.00 as damages, P700.00 as
attorney’s fee and the cost of the suit. Court of Appeals affirmed the decision.

ISSUE:

WON an unborn child has personality so that if the unborn child incurs injury, his parents may recover
damages from the ones who caused the damage to the unborn child.

RULING:

Personality begins at conception. This personality is called presumptive personality. It is, of course,
essential that birth should occur later, otherwise the fetus will be considered as never having possessed
legal personality.

Since an action for pecuniary damages on account of injury or death pertains primarily to the one injured,
it is easy to see that if no action for damages could be instituted on behalf of the unborn child on account
of injuries it received, no such right of action could derivatively accrue to its parents or heirs. In fact, even
if a cause of action did accrue on behalf of the unborn child, the same was extinguished by its pre-natal
death, since no transmission to anyone can take place from one that lacked juridical personality.
It is no answer to invoke the presumptive personality of a conceived child under Article 40 of the Civil
Code because that same article expressly limits such provisional personality by imposing the condition
that the child should be subsequently born alive. In the present case, the child was dead when separated
from its mother’s womb.

This is not to say that the parents are not entitled to damages. However, such damages must be those
inflicted directly upon them, as distinguished from injury or violation of the rights of the deceased child.

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