Fraud as a ground for annulment of marriage

By Atty. Eduardo T. Reyes III

Trust is the glue that binds the parties together in a marriage. The faith that one spouse reposes on the other is nurtured as early as the courtship stage, must be present during the wedding, and must subsist throughout the marriage.

When such trust is undermined or erodes, then the marriage would be in a downward spiral.

In Family Law, fraud or deceit, when employed to gain a spouse’s trust is serious as to constitute a ground for annulment of marriage under Article 45 of the Family Code.

Jurisprudence defines “fraud” as the voluntary execution of a wrongful act, or a willful omission, knowing and intending the effects which naturally and necessarily arise from such act or omission. In its general sense, fraud is deemed to comprise anything calculated to deceive, including all acts and omissions and concealment involving a breach of legal or equitable duty, trust, or confidence justly reposed, resulting in damage to another, or by which an undue and unconscientious advantage is taken of another. Fraud is also described as embracing all multifarious means which human ingenuity can device, and which are resorted to by one individual to secure an advantage over another by false suggestions or by suppression of truth and includes all surprise, trick, cunning, dissembling, and any unfair way by which another is cheated. (Virata v. Ng Wee, G .R. No. 220926 , July 5, 2017).

However, for purposes of annulment of marriage, fraud is limited to the following acts only:

“(1) Non-disclosure of a previous conviction by final judgment of the other party of a crime involving moral turpitude;

(2) Concealment by the wife of the fact that at the time of the marriage, she was pregnant by a man other than her husband;

(3) Concealment of sexually transmissible disease, regardless of its nature, existing at the time of the marriage; or

(4) Concealment of drug addiction, habitual alcoholism or homosexuality or lesbianism existing at the time of the marriage.” (Art. 46, Family Code)

To further underline the restrictive nature of the fraud that is envisaged in Article 46 of the Family Code, it states:

“No other misrepresentation or deceit as to character, health, rank, fortune or chastity shall constitute such fraud as will give grounds for action for the annulment of marriage.”

            Surely, when one is lured into entering a marriage because of promises of wealth, status, character or title, or even chastity, which turn out to be false, these are not grounds to annul a marriage.

            In other words, the kind of fraud that could be a ground for annulment of marriage must clearly fall under any of those kinds of fraud that Article 46 specifically mentions. In Republic v. Villacorta, G.R. No. 249953, June 23, 2021, a wife concealed from her husband that the child she gave birth to is not his. The child was already 3 years old at the time of the marriage. May the husband file a petition to annul the marriage on the ground that his wife “concealed the fact that she was pregnant by a man other than her husband”?

The answer is, no. As explained in Villacorta, since the wife was not pregnant at the time of marriage as the child was already 3 years old at that time, then it is not the kind of concealment that constitutes as fraud for purposes of annulment. This is despite a clear concealment on the part of the wife that the child she gave birth to is not that of her husband.

However, in the more recent case of Salva-Roldan v. Roldan, G.R. No. 268109, March 3, 2025, which involves a case of concealment of homosexuality by the husband, and the issue of whether such amounts to fraud which is a ground for annulment of marriage, the Supreme Court said, yes.

There, it was concluded that when the woman’s consent to the marriage was obtained through fraud pursuant to Art. 45 (3) in relation to Art. 46 (4) of the Family Code ie., (4) concealment of drug addiction, habitual alcoholism or homosexuality or lesbianism existing at the time of marriage,” it shall render the marriage as voidable. (Salva-Roldan v. Roldan, G.R. No. 268109, March 3, 2025).

Marriages are always subject to protection by the state such that getting an annulment requires strict compliance with the law. Yet, when the law is followed, courts are also ready to grant an annulment as it is in consonance with the social reality that a defective or void marriage is no marriage at all. (Tan-Andal v. Andal, G.R. No. 196359, May 11, 2021).

The author is the senior partner of ET Reyes III & Associates (ETRIIILaw)– a law firm based in Iloilo City. He is a litigation attorney, a law professor, MCLE lecturer, bar reviewer and a book author. Among the books he authored is Law on Property and Essentials of Land Registration [2024 Edition] which was on the bestseller’s list in online shops for several months. His website is etriiilaw.com.