Edward Douglass White

“ Indeed, when the power of the court below to review the facts is considered, that power, instead of sustaining, refutes the proposition relied on. Thus the proposition is that the court should have reversed the conviction because of the contention as to the insufficiency of the complaint, when no such question had been raised before final judgment in the trial court, and when, as a necessary consequence of the facts found by the court, the testimony offered at the trial without objection or question in any form established every essential ingredient of the crime. ”

“ It is conceded at bar that, under the Philippine law, the offense of adultery, as defined by the articles in question, is classed as a private offense, and must be prosecuted, not on information by the public prosecutor, but by complaint on behalf of an injured party. In the court of first instance of Albay, eighth judicial district, Philippine Islands, Adriano Mortiga, the defendant in error, as the husband of Maria Obleno, filed a complaint charging her with adultery committed with Vicente Serra, the other plaintiff in error, who was also charged. ”

“ Turning to the text of the articles of the Philippine Penal Code upon which the prosecution was based, it will be seen that an essential ingredient of the crime of adultery, as therein defined, is knowledge on the part of the man charged of the fact that the woman with whom the adultery was committed was a married woman. ”