Article 267 of the Revised Penal Code: Kidnapping and serious illegal detention

Read word by word, the article has these parts:

• The offender is a private individual. A public officer or employee who detains a person without legal grounds is covered instead by Article 124, arbitrary detention.
• He kidnaps or detains another, or deprives the person of liberty in any other way.
• One of four circumstances is present:
  1. the kidnapping or detention lasted more than three days;
  2. the offender pretended to act with public authority, for example by posing as a police officer;
  3. the victim suffered serious physical injuries, or the offender threatened to kill the victim;
  4. the victim is a minor, unless the accused is a parent, a female or a public officer.

One circumstance is enough. If none is present and there is no ransom, the crime is slight illegal detention under Article 268, which has a lower penalty (see below).

The second paragraph says the penalty is death when the purpose is to extort ransom from the victim or anyone else. It adds "even if none of the circumstances above-mentioned were present". So a short detention of an adult, with no injuries and no threats, is still punished by this paragraph if the aim was ransom.

The third paragraph says "the maximum penalty" applies when the victim is killed or dies because of the detention, is raped, or is subjected to torture or dehumanizing acts.

The penalties "reclusion perpetua to death" and "death" come from Republic Act No. 7659 (1993). Since 2006, Republic Act No. 9346 prohibits the imposition of the death penalty. Section 2 of that law says reclusion perpetua is imposed instead when the law uses the penalty names of the Revised Penal Code, as Article 267 does. Reclusion perpetua lasts from 20 years and 1 day to 40 years (Article 27).

Section 3 of RA 9346 adds that people convicted of offenses punished with reclusion perpetua, or whose sentences are reduced to reclusion perpetua because of that law, are not eligible for parole under Act No. 4103.

Article 268 covers the same acts when none of the circumstances of Article 267 is present. As amended by Republic Act No. 10951, it provides:

• Penalty: reclusion temporal, which runs from 12 years and 1 day to 20 years. The same penalty applies to anyone who furnishes the place for the crime.
• Voluntary release: if the offender frees the victim within three days from the start of the detention, without having reached his purpose, and before criminal proceedings are started against him, the penalty is prision mayor in its minimum and medium periods (6 years and 1 day to 10 years) and a fine of up to ₱100,000.