ALEJANDRA REPOLLO ET AL., APPLICANTS AND APPELLEES, VS. BERNABE BALECHA, OPPOSITOR AND APPELLANT.

These seven cases were instituted for the registration of the parcels
of land described therein. Bernabe Balecha filed his opposition thereto
in each and every one of them. The judgment appealed from, which denied
Balecha’s opposition, was in favor of the applications filed in all of
the seven cases in question.

Prior to the institution of
these seven cases, Bernabe Balecha had already applied for the
registration of the same parcels of land in his name. The herein
applicants then filed oppositions thereto. In the former case the trial
court denied the application and sustained the opposition, under the
following findings of fact, to wit:

“After
a careful examination of the evidence, both oral and documentary,
adduced by the parties, the court is of the opinion, and so finds that
the land subject of the registration application of the said Bernabe
Balecha is not now, nor has it ever been at any time before, possessed
or owned by the said applicant nor by his alleged predecessor in
interest, Mariano Balecha, the same being actually occupied by the
opponents surnamed Paguyo and Repollo and the successors in interest of
some of the latter as the exclusive owners thereof, whose possession
together with that of their predecessors in interest has always been
open, public, adverse, continuous, uninterrupted and as owners for a
period which dates back during the Spanish regime, not less than forty
years to say the least.”

No appeal was taken from the aforesaid judgment.

It was agreed that the evidence presented in the former case, wherein
Bernabe Balecha was the applicant and the herein applicants, the
oppositors, be considered also as evidence in these seven cases which
are now the subject matter of Bernabe Balecha’s appeal, as oppositor
herein. Neither party has presented any other additional evidence.

The question is now raised whether the judgment rendered in the former
case, wherein Balecha was the applicant and the herein applicants, the
oppositors, constitutes res judicata in these seven cases
wherein the therein oppositors are now the applicants and Balecha, the
oppositor. Of course, it does not, on the ground that the question
involved herein is different from the question involved in the other
case: That in the case instituted by Balecha, the question was whether
or not he had the right to register the property in his name. It was
not a question of whether or not the land should be registered in the
name of the oppositors because the law in force at the time of the
institution of the former case did not allow any finding to the latter
effect. The question involved in these seven cases is whether the land
in question should be registered in the name of the applicants, who
were the same oppositors in the former.

Neither would it constitute res judicata,
even if we were to consider Balecha now as an applicant for the second
time under Act No. 3621, which allows the court to order registration
in the name of the oppositor, on the ground that judgments rendered
prior to the enactment of the said law did not constitute res judicata, in accordance with repeated decisions of this court.

The fact that, although Act No. 3621 was not in force when Balecha
instituted the former case, it went into effect at the time judgment
was rendered therein, and does not affect the question at all inasmuch
as the then oppositors did not invoke the benefits afforded by the said
law and the court merely sustained their opposition without ordering
the registration of the land in question in their name.

However, we are of the opinion that the evidence supports the judgment
appealed from in these seven cases. In arriving at this conclusion, we
have taken into consideration what has been said in the case of Cruz
and Cruz vs. Cruz (47 Phil., 10), to wit:

“LAND
REGISTRATION; EVIDENCE; FINDINGS OF FACT IN FORMER DECISIONS.—Though
former decisions in land registration cases denying the registration of
the land may not constitute res adjudicata in the strict
sense of the term, the findings of fact contained in such decisions
are, nevertheless, generally entitled to some credit and may be taken
into consideration in subsequent litigation over the same land between
the same parties or their successors in interest.”

This doctrine has greater force in appeals of this nature wherein the
only evidence is no more than what has been presented in the case
formerly instituted by the appellant.

Wherefore, the
judgment appealed from in each and every one of these seven cases is
hereby affirmed, with the costs against the appellant. So ordered.

Street, Vickers, Butte, and Diaz, JJ., concur.