By Rey G. Panaligan
Published Jul 15, 2025 11:34 am
The Supreme Court (SC) has ruled that fraudulent concealment of homosexuality from a spouse before and at the time of marriage is a valid ground to annul marriage.
With the ruling, the SC reversed both the decisions of the trial court and the Court of Appeals (CA) as it granted the nullification of marriage sought by a wife who found that her husband is a homosexual.
The decision in the case docketed as GR No. 268109 and posted in the SC website – sc.judiciary.gov.ph – on Tuesday, July 15, was written by Associate Justice Antonio T. Kho Jr.
The SC decision was grounded on the provisions of Articles 45, 46, and 47 of the Family Code on consent obtained by fraud; concealment of drug addiction, habitual alcoholism or homosexuality or lesbianism existing at the time of marriage; and filing of case for annulment of marriage within five years from discovery of the fraud.
In 2010, the wife met through social media her husband who was then working in Saudi Arabia. In 2011, they became sweethearts. They met personally in 2012 when the husband came back to the Philippines.
On their first date, the wife noticed that her husband was very distant and she wondered why they neither kissed nor held hands. The husband did not even sit beside her when they commuted not even when they had lunch.
The wife confronted her husband who confessed his timidity and lack of confidence. The husband disclosed that his wife was his first girlfriend even if he was already 31 years old at that time.
They were married in 2013. After their wedding, they lived together but the husband continued to avoid intimacy and often started arguments to avoid being close to his wife.
Two months after their marriage, the husband returned to his overseas work and stopped communicating with his wife.
Later, the wife found magazines of half-naked and naked male models among her husband’s things.
When the wife confronted him, the husband admitted he is a homosexual. The wife left their conjugal home and returned to her parents. She then filed a case in 2017 for nullity of marriage based on fraud committed by her husband.
She told the court that she would not have married him if she knew the truth that he was a homosexual.
The husband did not appear during the trial court’s proceedings. Only the wife’s testimony and the testimony of the husband’s father were presented in court.
Both the trial court and the CA, on appeal filed by the wife, dismissed the marriage nullification case with rulings that there was lack of sufficient evidence to show the husband’s homosexuality or that he deliberately concealed his sexuality to persuade her to marry him.
The trial court and the CA also found that the testimonies of the wife and the husband’s father were self-serving and unverified by other evidence.
Undaunted, the wife elevated the case to the SC.
The SC said: “Marriage is a special contract of permanent union between a man and a woman entered into in accordance with law for the establishment of conjugal and family life. To be valid, consent must be freely given by both parties. Thus, a marriage may be annulled when consent was obtained by fraud.”
It also said that contrary to the ruling of the trial court and the CA, the wife was able to prove that her husband concealed his homosexuality from her and thus vitiating her consent to marry him.
It pointed out: “No woman would put herself in a shameful position if the fact that she married a homosexual was not true. More so, no man would keep silent when his sexuality is being questioned thus creating disgrace in his name.”
Thus, the SC ruled that the marriage “must be annulled on the ground of fraudulent concealment of homosexuality pursuant to Article 45(3) in relation to Article 46(4) of the Family Code.”
