Short answer. You can compromise the civil liability, but you cannot buy your way out of the criminal case. Article 2034 allows a compromise on the civil side of an offense, yet it provides in the same breath that the compromise does not extinguish the public action for imposing the legal penalty.
What the law says
There may be a compromise upon the civil liability arising from an offense; but such compromise shall not extinguish the public action for the imposition of the legal penalty.
Civil Code, Article 2034 — Compromise on Civil Liability From a Crime. Read the full provision →
Two liabilities from one act
A single offense produces two distinct liabilities: a criminal one, owed to the State for breaking its law, and a civil one, owed to the person harmed for the damage done. Article 2034 is about the second. It confirms that there may be a compromise upon the civil liability arising from an offense — the accused and the offended party can settle the indemnity, the restitution and the damages between themselves. What the article then makes clear is that settling that private debt does not reach the public wrong, which stands on a different footing entirely.
What the criminal case is not
The reason a settlement cannot end the prosecution is stated in the article's second clause: the compromise shall not extinguish the public action for the imposition of the legal penalty. A crime is treated as an offense against the community, prosecuted by the State in its own name, not a dispute the victim owns and can trade away. The offended party controls the money claim, but the decision to press or drop the penalty rests with the prosecution, not with whoever received payment. Paying the civil indemnity is therefore not the same as being forgiven the crime.
What a civil compromise does achieve
Within its own lane, a compromise on civil liability is fully effective and often worth making. It fixes and closes the accused's obligation to pay for the harm — the medical costs, the lost property, the damages — without the delay and expense of litigating that claim to judgment. For the offended party it can mean prompt, certain recovery instead of years of enforcement. It simply does not carry the further consequence some hope for: the criminal case continues, and the settlement resolves the debt, not the charge.
Where a settlement still matters to the criminal side
Although a compromise cannot extinguish the public action, restitution and a genuine settlement are not irrelevant to how a criminal case unfolds; they bear on matters the court weighs when it comes to penalty. But that is a benefit the court may consider, not an entitlement the parties can guarantee by contract, and it is separate from the article's rule. Anyone settling the civil side should treat it as exactly that — a resolution of the money owed — and take advice on the criminal exposure rather than assume the payment closes the whole matter.
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.
- People of the Philippines vs. Rowena Hermoso Benedictus, G.R. No. 123906, March 27, 1998 — read the decision on LawPhil →