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FIRST DIVISION
[ G.R. No. 202039, August 14, 2019 ]
ANGELITA SIMUNDAC-KEPPEL, PETITIONER, VS. GEORG KEPPEL,
RESPONDENT.
DECISION
BERSAMIN, C.J.:
The courts do not take judicial notice of foreign laws. To have evidentiary weight in a
judicial proceeding, the foreign laws should be alleged and proved like any other
material fact.
This Case
By this appeal, the petitioner assails the decision promulgated on September 26,
2011[1] by the Court of Appeals (CA) that reversed the judgment rendered on June 21,
2006[2] by the Regional Trial Court (RTC) in Muntinlupa City in Civil Case No. 96-048.
Antecedents
As summarized by the CA, the factual antecedents are as follows:
In November 1972, petitioner Angelita Simundac Keppel (Angelita) left the
Philippines to work in Germany as a nurse. In the hospital where Angelita
worked, she met Reynaldo Macaraig (Reynaldo), also a nurse and fellow
Filipino who had become a naturalized German citizen. They fell in love and
got married in Germany on 12 June 1976. Angelita and Reynaldo's union
produced a son.
After a few years of marriage, Angelita became attracted to another German
nurse and co-employee, Georg Keppel (Georg). Like Angelita, Georg was
married to a Filipina nurse, with whom he had two children. Eventually, the
attraction between Angelita and Georg developed into an intimate affair. Not
long after that, Reynaldo discovered Angelita's infidelity and they separated.
In the meantime, in February 1986, Angelita became a naturalized German
citizen. Angelita and her son left Germany to go home to the Philippines,
where they planned to start over.
While in the Philippines, Angelita continued communicating with Georg
through letters and telephone calls. In July 1987, Georg's wife divorced him,
and so Georg felt free to come to the Philippines to meet Angelita's family in
September 1987.
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