What is an exempting circumstance?
The exempting circumstances are imbecility or insanity, minority, accident, compulsion of irresistible force, impulse of uncontrollable fear of an equal or greater injury, lawful or insuperable cause. Absolutory causes and instigation of a peace officer produce also the effect of an exempting circumstance.
The Criminal Defense of Necessity
The defendant must reasonably have believed that there was an actual and specific threat that required immediate action. The defendant must have had no realistic alternative to completing the criminal act. The harm caused by the criminal act must not be greater than the harm avoided.
Exempting Circumstances- These are defenses where the accused committed a crime but is not criminally liable. There is a crime, and there is civil liability but no criminal. 1. The basis is the lack of any of the elements which makes the act/omission voluntary, i.e. freedom, intelligence, intent or due care.
–it must consist of an extraneous force coming from a third person. A person who acts under compulsion of an irresistible force like one who acts under impulse of uncontrollable fear of equal or greater injury –exempt from criminal liability because he does not act with freedom.
Ruling of the Court
The indispensable requisite for either of these justifying circumstances is that the victim must have mounted an unlawful aggression against the accused or the stranger. Without such unlawful aggression, the accused is not entitled to the justifying circumstance.
"Self-defense, as a justifying circumstance that exonerates criminal liability, requires the following essential elements: (1) unlawful aggression on the part of the victim; (2) reasonable necessity of the means employed to prevent or repel such aggression; and (3) lack of sufficient provocation on the part of the ...
its elements exist, to wit: (a) unlawful aggression; (b) reasonable necessity of the means employed to prevent or repel the attack; and (c) the person defending be not induced by revenge, resentment, or other evil motive.
Basis: The exemption from punishment is based on the complete absence of intelligence, freedom of action, or intent, or on the absence of negligence on the part of the accused.
Justifying circumstance affects the act, not the actor; while exempting circumstance affects the actor, not the act. In justifying circumstance, no criminal and, generally, no civil liability is incurred; while in exempting circumstance, civil liability is generally incurred although there is no criminal liability.
Minority As An Exempting Circumstance Is Determined By One's Birth Date And Not By One's Mental Age. Accused-appellant Roxas was charged of five counts of rape against AAA, a minor who was 9 years old at the time of the first rape and 10 ...
What are the 3 exemptions of punishment?
Basis: The exemption from punishment is based on the complete absence of intelligence, freedom of action, or intent, or on the absence of negligence on the part of the accused.
An example of this is when a father returns from work to find his daughter being raped. The father kills the rapist by slamming a solid wooden chair on his head while the rapist is still doing his thing. Once again, reasonable necessity of means and actual or imminent aggression come into play.

Mitigating circumstances must be relevant to why an offense was committed. Examples of mitigating circumstances include the age, history, and remorsefulness of the defendant.
- Minor role. The defendant played a relatively minor role in the crime. ...
- Victim culpability. The victim willingly participated in the crime or initiated the events leading to it. ...
- Unusual circumstance. ...
- No harm. ...
- Lack of record. ...
- Relative necessity. ...
- Remorse. ...
- Difficult personal history.