Republic of the
Supreme Court
THIRD DIVISION
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ANA
DE GUIA SAN PEDRO and
ALEJO DOPEÑO, Petitioners, - versus - HON.
FATIMA G. ASDALA, in her capacity as the Presiding Judge of the Regional
Trial Court of Quezon City, Branch 87; HON. MANUEL TARO, in his capacity as
the Presiding Judge of the Metropolitan Trial Court of Quezon City, Branch
42; and the HEIRS OF SPOUSES APOLONIO V. DIONISIO and VALERIANA DIONISIO (namely,
ALLAN GEORGE R. DIONISIO and ELEANOR R. DIONISIO, herein represented by ALLAN
GEORGE R. DIONISIO), Respondents. |
G.R.
No. 164560 Present:
Ynares-Santiago,
J., Chairperson, chico-nazario, VELASCO, JR., nachura, and PERALTA, JJ. Promulgated: July 22, 2009
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- - - - - - - - - - - -x D E C I S
I O N PERALTA, J.: |
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This resolves the petition for certiorari
under Rule 65 of the Rules of Court, praying that the Resolutions[1]
of the Court of Appeals (CA) dated
The antecedent facts are as follows.
Sometime
in July 2001, private respondents, heirs of spouses Apolonio and Valeriana
Dionisio, filed with the Metropolitan Trial Court (MeTC) of P32,100.00, was titled in the name of spouses
Apolonio and Valeriana Dionisio; but petitioners, with malice and evident bad faith, claimed that
they were the owners of a parcel of land that encompasses and covers subject
property. Private respondents had allegedly
been prevented from entering, possessing and using subject property. It was further alleged in the Complaint that
petitioners' Transfer Certificate of Title over their alleged property was
spurious. Private respondents then
prayed that they be declared the sole and absolute owners of the subject
property; that petitioners be ordered to surrender possession of subject
property to them; that petitioners and Wood Crest and/or its members be ordered
to pay actual and moral damages, and attorney's fees.
Petitioners,
for their part, filed a Motion to Dismiss[3]
said complaint on the ground that the MeTC had no jurisdiction over the subject
matter of the action, as the subject of litigation was incapable of pecuniary
estimation.
The
MeTC then issued
an Order[4]
dated July 4, 2002 denying the motion
to dismiss, ruling that, under Batas
Pambansa (B.P.) Blg. 129, as
amended, the MeTC had exclusive original jurisdiction over actions involving title to or possession of real property of small value.
Petitioners' Motion for Reconsideration
of said Order dated
Petitioners
assailed the aforementioned Order by filing a petition for certiorari with the Regional Trial Court (RTC) of P50,000.00. A Motion for Reconsideration[6]
of the Decision was filed by petitioners, but was denied in an Order[7]
dated
Petitioners
then filed with the Court of Appeals another petition for certiorari, insisting that both the MeTC and RTC acted with grave
abuse of discretion amounting to lack or excess of jurisdiction by not ordering
the dismissal of the complaint for Accion Reivindicatoria, for lack of
jurisdiction over the same. In the
assailed CA Resolution dated
Thus,
petitioners filed the instant petition and, in support thereof, they allege
that:
THE
HONORABLE COURT OF APPEALS ACTED WITH GRAVE ABUSE OF DISCRETION AMOUNTING TO
LACK OR IN (SIC) EXCESS OF JURISDICTION IN DENYING THE PETITION FOR CERTIORARI AND FOR FAILURE TO RESOLVE
THE ISSUE RAISED IN THE CERTIORARI
REGARDING THE JURISDICTION OF THE METROPOLITAN TRIAL COURT TO TAKE COGNIZANCE
OF A CASE OF ACCION REINVINDICATORIA.
THE
HONORABLE PUBLIC RESPONDENT FATIMA GONZALES-ASDALA, AS PRESIDING JUDGE OF RTC
BRANCH 87, QUEZON CITY, ACTED WITH GRAVE ABUSE OF DISCRETION AMOUNTING TO LACK
OR IN EXCESS OF (SIC) JURISDICTION IN DISMISSING THE PETITION FOR CERTIORARI AND IN RESOLVING THAT A CASE
OF ACCION REINVINDICATORIA IS WITHIN THE JURISDICTION OF THE METROPOLITAN
TRIAL COURT.
THE
HONORABLE PUBLIC RESPONDENT MANUEL TARO AS PRESIDING JUDGE MeTC, BRANCH 42,
The
present Petition for Certiorari is doomed and should not have been
entertained from the very beginning.
The
settled rule is that appeals from judgments or final orders or resolutions of
the CA should be by a verified petition for review on certiorari, as
provided for under Rule 45 of the Revised Rules of Civil Procedure. Thus, in Pasiona, Jr. v. Court of Appeals,[10]
the Court expounded as follows:
The aggrieved party is proscribed from assailing a decision or final order of the CA via Rule 65, because such recourse is proper only if the party has no plain, speedy and adequate remedy in the course of law. In this case, petitioner had an adequate remedy, namely, a petition for review on certiorari under Rule 45 of the Rules of Court. A petition for review on certiorari, not a special civil action for certiorari was, therefore, the correct remedy.
x x x x
Settled is the rule that where appeal is available to the aggrieved party, the special civil action for certiorari will not be entertained – remedies of appeal and certiorari are mutually exclusive, not alternative or successive. Hence, certiorari is not and cannot be a substitute for a lost appeal, especially if one's own negligence or error in one's choice of remedy occasioned such loss or lapse. One of the requisites of certiorari is that there be no available appeal or any plain, speedy and adequate remedy. Where an appeal was available, as in this case, certiorari will not prosper, even if the ground therefor is grave abuse of discretion. Petitioner's resort to this Court by Petition for Certiorari was a fatal procedural error, and the instant petition must, therefore, fail.[11]
For the very same reason
given above, the CA, therefore, acted properly when it dismissed the petition
for certiorari outright, on the
ground that petitioners should have resorted to the remedy of appeal instead of
certiorari. Verily, the
present Petition for Certiorari should not have been given due course at
all.
Moreover,
since the period for petitioners to file a petition for review on certiorari
had lapsed by the time the instant petition was filed, the assailed CA Resolutions
have attained finality.
Nevertheless,
just to put the matter to rest, the Court reiterates the ruling in Heirs of Valeriano S. Concha, Sr. v. Spouses Lumocso,[12] to wit:
In
a number of cases, we have held that actions for reconveyance of or for
cancellation of title to or to quiet title over real property are actions that
fall under the classification of cases that involve “title to, or possession of, real property, or any interest therein.”
x x x x
x x x Thus, under the old law, there was no substantial effect on
jurisdiction whether a case is one, the subject matter of which was incapable
of pecuniary estimation, under Section 19(1) of B.P. 129, or one involving
title to property under Section 19(2).
The distinction between the two classes became crucial with the
amendment introduced by R.A. No. 7691 in 1994, which expanded the exclusive
original jurisdiction of the first level courts to include "all civil
actions which involve title to, or possession of, real property, or any
interest therein where the assessed
value of the property or interest therein does not exceed Twenty thousand pesos
(P20,000.00) or, in civil actions in Metro Manila, where such assessed
value does not exceed Fifty thousand pesos (P50,000.00) exclusive of
interest, damages of whatever kind, attorney's fees, litigation expenses and
costs." Thus, under the present law, original jurisdiction over
cases the subject matter of which involves "title to, possession of, real
property or any interest therein" under Section 19(2) of B.P. 129 is
divided between the first and second level courts, with the assessed value of
the real property involved as the benchmark. This amendment was introduced
to "unclog the overloaded dockets of the RTCs which would result in the speedier
administration of justice."[13]
Clearly,
the RTC and the CA ruled correctly that the MeTC had jurisdiction over private
respondents' complaint for Accion Reivindicatoria.
IN VIEW
OF THE FOREGOING, the petition is DISMISSED
for utter lack of merit. The Resolutions
of the Court of Appeals in CA-G.R. SP No. 78978, dated
SO
ORDERED.
DIOSDADO
M. PERALTA
Associate
Justice
WE CONCUR:
CONSUELO YNARES-SANTIAGO
Associate Justice
Chairperson
MINITA
V. CHICO-NAZARIO PRESBITERO J.
VELASCO, JR.
Associate Justice Associate
Justice
ANTONIO EDUARDO B. NACHURA
Associate Justice
ATTESTATION
I attest that the conclusions in the above Decision
had been reached in consultation before the case was assigned to the writer of
the opinion of the Court’s Division.
CONSUELO YNARES-SANTIAGO
Associate
Justice
Third
Division, Chairperson
CERTIFICATION
Pursuant to Section 13, Article VIII of the Constitution and the
Division Chairperson’s Attestation, I certify that the conclusions in the above
Decision were reached in consultation before the case was assigned to the
writer of the opinion of the Court’s Division.
REYNATO
S. PUNO
Chief Justice
[1] Penned by Associate Justice Delilah Vidallon-Magtolis, with Associate Justices Jose L. Sabio, Jr. and Hakim S. Abdulwahid, concurring; rollo, pp. 27 & 29.
[2] Rollo, pp. 37-48.
[3]
[4]
[5] Penned by Judge Fatima Gonzales-Asdala; id. at 194-195.
[6] Rollo, pp. 196-199.
[7]
[8]
[9]
[10]
G.R. No. 165471,
[11]
[12] G.R.
No. 158121,
[13]