Amendment to Penal Code on Reckless Imprudence

Section 1 amends Article 365 of the Revised Penal Code and replaces it with a revised text governing criminal liability for reckless imprudence and simple imprudence or negligence.
The Act sets the penalty framework and definitions within Article 365, including rules on how courts impose penalties.
Section 1 specifically provides a special rule when death results through imprudence or negligence with violation of the Automobile Law.

Republic Act No. 1790 provides penalty rules for offenders who commit acts or omissions causing harm due to imprudence or negligence, including reckless imprudence and simple imprudence or negligence.

Reckless imprudence consists of voluntarily, but without malice, doing or failing to do an act that results in material damage due to inexcusable lack of precaution, considering the person’s employment or occupation, degree of intelligence, physical condition, and other circumstances regarding persons, time, and place.
Simple imprudence consists of lack of precaution in cases where the damage impending to be caused is not immediate and the danger is not clearly manifest.
Material damage results is treated as the outcome element that triggers the penalty rules under the categories of imprudence described.

Any person who, by reckless imprudence, commits an act that would constitute a grave felony if intentional shall suffer arresto mayor in its maximum period to prision correccional in its medium period.
If the act would have constituted a less grave felony if intentional, the offender shall be punished by arresto mayor in its minimum and medium periods.
If the act would have constituted a light felony if intentional, the offender shall be punished by arresto menor in its maximum period.

Any person who, by simple imprudence or negligence, commits an act that would otherwise constitute a grave felony shall suffer arresto mayor in its medium and maximum periods.
If it would have constituted a less serious felony, the offender shall be punished by arresto mayor in its minimum period.
When execution of the act covered by Article 365 results only in damage to the property of another, the offender shall be punished by a fine ranging from an amount equal to the value of the damages to three times such value, but in no case less than twenty-five pesos.
A fine not exceeding two-hundred pesos and censure shall be imposed upon any person who, by simple imprudence or negligence, causes some wrong that, if maliciously done, would have constituted a light felony.

In imposing penalties under Article 365, courts shall exercise their sound discretion and impose penalties without regard to the rules prescribed in Article sixty-four.
Section 1 directs courts to apply a degree-based penalty adjustment in two instances (see next section).

Article 365 provides that its general provisions shall not be applicable:
- When the penalty provided for the offense is equal to or lower than those provided in the first two paragraphs of Article 365, in which case courts impose the penalty next lower in degree than that which should be imposed in the period courts may deem proper to apply; and
- When, by imprudence or negligence and with violation of the Automobile Law, the death of a person is caused, in which case the defendant shall be punished by prision correctional in its medium and maximum periods.
Article 365 imposes an enhanced rule: the penalty next higher in degree shall be imposed upon an offender who fails to lend on the spot to the injured parties such help as may be in his hands to give.

Article 365 assigns discretion to courts in choosing periods and degrees of penalty, stating that courts act with sound discretion in imposing the penalties described.
Article 365 expressly instructs courts to impose penalties without regard to Article sixty-four when applying the penalties for imprudence and negligence.

Reckless imprudence penalty ranges are set by the severity classification of what the act would have been if intentional (grave felony, less grave felony, light felony).
Simple imprudence or negligence penalty ranges are set by the severity classification of what the act would have been if malicious or intentional (grave felony, less serious felony), with a special property-damage fine regime when only property damage results.
Simple imprudence or negligence for a wrong that would have been a light felony if maliciously done carries a capped monetary penalty (fine not exceeding two-hundred pesos) plus censure.
A failure to render immediate on-the-spot help increases liability by imposing the penalty next higher in degree.
When death results through imprudence or negligence with violation of the Automobile Law, punishment is prision correctional in its medium and maximum periods.

Section 2 provides that Republic Act No. 1790 takes effect upon its approval (June 21, 1957).