PEOPLE VS.

LUCAS
288 SCRA 296
G.R. Nos. 108172-73

FACTS:
Jose Conrado Lucas was charged for the crime of rape of his daughter Chanda Lucas. On
26 November 1983, she was sleeping in the bedroom with her brother and sisters. Their mother
did not sleep in their house at that time. At about 2:00 to 3:00 a.m., she awoke and realized that
her father was removing her panty and shorts. He cautioned her to keep quiet. Then, her father,
who was already naked, went on top of her and placed his sexual organ inside her vagina. She was
hurt but did not resist because her father threatened to kill her. Only her older sister Cynthia
witnessed the incident. Chanda reported the incident to her mother and her aunt but the former did
nothing. When her aunt said that her father should be jailed, her mother did not agree.
The 26 November 1983 incident was only the first of many atrocities. Since then, her father
had been repeatedly molesting her, especially when her mother was not around. The last assault
on her womanhood occurred on 12 February 1991 when she was already seventeen years old.

CONTENTION OF THE STATE:

Trial court promulgated its decision in finding the accused guilty beyond reasonable doubt
of two crimes of rape and sentenced to suffer the penalty of RECLUSION PERPETUA.

CONTENTION OF THE ACCUSED:

He contends that he could not be validly convicted of rape in Criminal Case No. Q-91-
18466 under a complaint for attempted rape only. He cites the rule that when the offense proved
is more serious than that charged, the accused can only be convicted of the offense charged.

RESOLUTION:
The offense charged in Criminal Case No. Q-91-18466 (attempted rape) is necessarily
included in the offense that was proved (consummated rape). Accordingly, the accused should be
convicted of attempted rape only. The penalty for attempted rape is prision mayor, which is two
degrees lower than that provided by law for rape. The accused is entitled to the benefits of the
Indeterminate Sentence Law, and for attempted rape he may be sentenced to a penalty whose
minimum should be within the range of prision correccional and whose maximum should be
within the range range of prision mayor, taking into account the modifying circumstances.

Prior to R.A. No. 7659, the presence of modifying circumstances would not affect the
penalty of reclusion perpetua prescribed for the crime of rape because such a penalty was then
indivisible and under Article 63 of the Revised Penal Code, when the law prescribes a single
indivisible penalty, it shall be applied by the courts regardless of any mitigating or aggravating
circumstances that may have attended the commission of the deed. However, pursuant to Section
21 of R.A. No. 7659, which amended Article 27 of the Revised Penal Code, reclusion perpetua
has now a defined duration, i.e., from twenty (20) years and one (1) day to forty (40) years. There
is, however, no corresponding amendment to Article 76 of the same Code for the purpose of
converting reclusion perpetua into a divisible penalty with three specific period minimum,
medium, and maximum and including it in the table provided therein showing the duration and
the time included in each of the periods.