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Judicial Admissions








Definition 
Admissions, verbal or written, made by the party in the course of
the proceedings in the same case. It requires no proof.
(Rule 129,Sec.4)

Judicial Admissions
Are those so made in the pleadings filed or in the progress of a trial.

Extrajudicial Admissions
Are those made out of court, or in a judicial proceeding other than
the one under consideration.

Judicial admission may be contradicted only by showing that:
1. It was made through palpable mistake;
2. No such admission was made.

Extrajudicial admissions or other admissions are, as a rule and where
elements of estoppel are not present, disputable.

A judicial admission may be oral as a verbal waiver of proof made in
open court, a withdrawal of a contention or a disclosure made before
the court, or an admission made by a witness in the course of his
testimony or deposition, or may be in writing as in pleading, bill of
particulars, stipulation of facts, request for admission, or a
judicial admission contained in an affidavit used in the case.

To be considered a judicial admission, the admission must be made in
the same case, otherwise, it is an extrajudicial admission.

When a defendant is declared in default for having failed to answer
the complaint, such a failure does not amount to an admission of the
facts alleged in the complaint.

Stipulations voluntarily entered into between the parties will be
respected and enforced by the court unless contrary to public policy
or good morals. However, the binding effect of the facts applies
only to the parties in agreement.

Pleadings superseded or amended disappear from the record of judicial
admissions, and in order that any statements contained therein may
be considered as an extrajudicial admission, it should be offered
formally in evidence.

Torres vs. CA (1984)
An original complaint, after being amended, loses its character as a
judicial admission, which would have required no proof. It becomes
merely an extra-judicial admission requiring a formal offer in order
to be admissible.

Bayas vs. Sandiganbayan
(GR Nos. 143689-91, November 12,2002)
There is nothing irregular or unlawful in stipulating facts in
criminal cases. The policy encouraging it is consistent with the
doctrine of waiver, which recognizes that ". . . everyone has a right
to waive and agree to waive the advantage of a law or rule made solely
for the benefit and protection of the individual in his private
capacity, if it can be dispensed with and relinquished without
infringing on any public right and without detriment to the community
at large."

      In the present case, the Joint Stipulation made by the
prosecution and petitioners was a waiver of the right to present
evidence on the facts and the documents freely admitted by them.

There could have been no impairment of petitioners' right to be presumed
innocent, right to due process or right against self-incrimination
because the waiver was voluntary, made with the assistance of counsel
and is sanctioned by the Rules on Criminal Procedure.

Once the stipulations are reduced into writing and signed by the
parties and their counsels, they become binding on the parties who
made them.

They become judicial admissions of the fact or facts stipulated.
Even if placed at a disadvantageous position, a party may not be
allowed to rescind them unilaterally; it must assume the consequences
of the disadvantage. If the accused are allowed to plead guilty under
appropriate circumstances, by parity of reasoning, they should
likewise be allowed to enter into a fair and true pretrial agreement
under appropriate circumstances.