Short answer. The second marriage is void from the beginning, and the law strips away the property advantages that came with it. Where both parties acted in bad faith, all donations by reason of the marriage and all testamentary dispositions each made in favour of the other are revoked automatically.
What the law says
If both spouses of the subsequent marriage acted in bad faith, said marriage shall be void ab initio and all donations by reason of marriage and testamentary dispositions made by one in favor of the other are revoked by operation of law.
Family Code, Article 44 — Bad Faith by Both Spouses: Void Ab Initio; Revoked Donations. Read the full provision →
Bad faith on both sides changes the character of the marriage
A subsequent marriage contracted after a judicial declaration of presumptive death is not a fraud on anyone if both parties genuinely believed the absent spouse was dead. The provision addresses the opposite case. Where both spouses of the subsequent marriage acted in bad faith, meaning each knew the first spouse was alive and married anyway, the marriage is not merely terminable on a later reappearance. It is void ab initio: void from the beginning, never valid for a moment, and incapable of being cured by however many years the couple then lived together.
The gifts go with it, without anyone having to sue
The sentence does not stop at nullity. All donations by reason of marriage and all testamentary dispositions one made in favour of the other are revoked by operation of law. Those last five words are the operative ones. Nobody needs to file a revocation case, ask a court to set the gifts aside, or prove that the donor changed their mind; the revocation follows from the bad faith and the nullity themselves. A will clause naming the other as a beneficiary falls in the same way as property handed over at the time of the wedding.
Why the law refuses to leave them where it found them
The logic is that neither party can invoke the marriage they both knew to be impossible in order to keep what the marriage gave them. A person who married in good faith, believing the absent spouse dead, is treated very differently by the surrounding provisions, precisely because their reliance on the declaration was honest. Mutual bad faith removes that protection from both sides at once. It is worth noticing that this is a civil consequence about status and property; the criminal exposure that contracting such a marriage may carry is a separate question governed by different law.
What the outcome will turn on
Everything hangs on knowledge, and knowledge is proved from records rather than assertions. What was said in the application for the declaration of presumptive death, and by whom; letters, remittances, messages or photographs showing contact with the absent spouse after the supposed disappearance; who attended the second wedding and what they were told. Assemble that chronology, together with the marriage certificates, any deed of donation and any will, before you see a lawyer. The same material usually decides both whether the marriage stands and whether the property transfers survive.
Cases citing this provision
These Supreme Court decisions cite the provision above. We list them so you can read them yourself; the summaries of what each decided are not ours to give.
- Lucila David and the Heirs of Rene F. Aguas, namely: Princess Luren D. Aguas, G.R. No. 241036, January 26, 2021 — read the decision on LawPhil →