NENITA CASAMPOL ANDEVELYN BALMONTE LARON, PLAINTIFFS-APPELLANTS, VS. ESTRELLA B. VICTORIA, CARMENCITA G. MAURICIO, LOLITA B. ESPONILLA AND EVANGELINE B. MAÑAS, DEFENDANTS-APPELL…
BUESER, J.:
rendered by the Regional Trial Court of Agoo, La Union, Branch 32,
which dismissed the present amended complaint for annulment of documents
and damages filed by plaintiffs-appellants Nenita Casampol and Evelyn
Balmonte (“Appellants”) against defendants-appellees Estrella Victoria,
Carmencita Mauricio, Lolita Esponilla and Evangeline Mañas
(“Appellees”). The dispositive portion of said Judgment reads in this
wise:
“WHEREFORE, the instant case is hereby DISMISSED for lack of merit.
The Deed of Extra-Judicial Settlement of Estate dated
December 31, 1994 is valid without prejudice to the filing of any
criminal or civil action with respect to the allegation of forgery in
the signature of Wilfredo Balmonte. The Deed of Absolute Sale dated July
2, 1996 is likewise declared valid.SO ORDERED.”
The Facts
The pertinent facts and antecedent proceedings, as borne by the records, are as follows:
Deceased Spouses Felipe Balmonte and Pastora Pascua were the original
registered owners of a parcel of land located in Barangay Udiao,
Rosario, La Union with an area of 2,796 square meters and covered by
Transfer Certificate of Title No. T-19866. They have four (4) children,
namely: Teofista, Antonina, Wilfredo and Florentino. Appellant Casampol
is the daughter of Teofista while appellant Balmonte is the daughter of
Antonina. Appellees, on the other hand, are the stepchildren of
Florentino.
After the death of Spouses Felipe and Pastora, their children
executed an Extra-Judicial Settlement of Estate dated 31 December 1994[2] partitioning said property among themselves.
Thereafter, in a Deed of Absolute Sale dated 2 July 1996,[3]
Antonina sold in favor of appellees two hundred ninety-seven square
meters (297 sq. m.) of the subject land representing one-half portion of
her allotted share therein. Antonina supposedly needed the money to
settle a case filed against her by a certain Romeo Libunao. Appellee
Victoria paid for the notarial fees for the preparation of said document
and also paid Antonina’s obligation to Romeo Libunao. Consequently,
appellees became the registered owners of the portion that they had
acquired from Antonina.
Apparently, Antonina was accompanied by appellant Casampol
during the negotiation of the sale and that the latter in fact signed as
a witness to the deed of sale. She was likewise a witness in the
execution of the deed of extra-judicial settlement.
Claiming that deceased Pastora had sold the subject land in
favor of Teofista and Antonina, appellants filed the present amended
complaint on 18 January 2011 seeking the annulment of the aforesaid deed
of extra-judicial settlement and deed of absolute sale.[4]
According to appellants, after purchasing the subject land
from deceased Pastora in consideration of Fifty Thousand Pesos
(P50,000.00), Teofista and Antonina sold the same in favor of their
daughters on 14 February 1990. Said sale was made verbally and also in
consideration of Fifty Thousand Pesos (P50,000.00). The certificate of
title was then given to them and was kept by appellant Casampol.
Afterwards, appellants took actual possession of the subject land for
more than twenty (20) years and had introduced improvements by
constructing two (2) concrete houses thereon. They also paid the realty
taxes of said land.
Countering appellants’ postulations,
appellees maintained the validity of the disputed sale by detailing the
process by which said sale had been negotiated and consummated. They
alleged that the Register of Deeds even requested Casampol to surrender
the duplicate original of the title and that the latter rejected such
request. They also claimed that they have been paying the realty taxes
on the land that they had purchased although they were not in possession
thereof.
In the now assailed Judgment, the trial court
sustained the validity of the disputed deeds noting that the same had
been notarized and had in fact been attested to by appellant Casampol as
a witness. The trial court emphasized that appellant Casampol, a police
officer, is a learned woman and cannot therefore feign ignorance of the
nature and content of said deeds.
Considering, however, that
the issue had been belatedly raised and remained unsubstantiated, the
trial court did not delve into the alleged forged signature of deceased
Wilfredo in the deed of extra-judicial settlement. It was further
observed that even if Wilfredo’s signature had in fact been forged,
Antonina validly conveyed to appellees the ownership over half of her
share in the partitioned property. Simply put, the disputed sale did not
involve Wilfredo’s share in the estate as it only pertains to half of
Antonina’s share.
Lastly, the trial court discarded the
testimony of Casampol finding it unbelievable and contrary to Filipino
family culture. Said testimony, the trial court ruled, is not worthy of
belief and cannot substantiate the alleged conveyance of the entire land
in favor of appellants.
Aggrieved, appellants filed the instant appeal.
The Issue
The main issue to be resolved in this petition is whether the
trial court erred in upholding the title of appellees over one-half
portion of Antonina’s share in the disputed estate as against the
proprietary claim of appellants over the entire property.
The Court’s Ruling
We find the present appeal bereft of merit.
Impugning
the factual findings and legal conclusions of the trial court, the
appellants espouse the following points of contention: First,
the oral contracts, having been executed, are valid and enforceable and
have thus conveyed the right of ownership and possession over the entire
property in their favor; Second, the deed of extra-judicial
settlement is null and void considering that it was simulated and the
signature of Wilfredo had been falsified; Third, the subject
property can no longer be subject of the extra-judicial settlement of
estate and sale in light of the fact that its ownership had already been
transferred to appellants; and Fourth, the appellees acted in
bad faith in purchasing the one-half portion of Antonina’s share given
that appellants had been in open, public and continuous possession over
the entire land in the concept of an owner.
We are not persuaded.
A reading of the records of this case readily reveals no reversible
error on the part of the trial court when it sustained the validity of
the Deed of Extra-Judicial Settlement and Deed of Absolute Sale. As
against the unsubstantiated and implausible adverse claim of appellants
over the subject property and absent proof that renders said documents
null and void, the evidence on record clearly establishes the title of
the appellees over the land that they had purchased. In fine, appellants
have failed to overcome their burden to prove their affirmative
allegation that they had previously acquired title over the entire lot
prior to the execution of the disputed deeds.
Jurisprudence is replete with rulings that in civil cases, the
party who alleges a fact has the burden of proving it. Burden of proof
is the duty of a party to present evidence on the facts in issue
necessary to prove the truth of his claim or defense by the amount of
evidence required by law.[5]
Emphatically, aside from their mere say so, appellants failed
to present clear and competent evidence to prove the execution, more so
the validity of the oral contracts upon which they anchor their
proprietary claim. No amount of reiteration and insistence can give a
semblance of credibility and merit to appellants’ claim that the
deceased Pastora verbally sold the entire land in favor of their
parents, and that they eventually acquired title thereto also through a
verbal contract sale.
True, where a verbal contract of sale has been partially
executed, the contract is taken out of the scope of the Statute of
Frauds, which requires that a contract for the sale of real property or
of an interest therein shall be unenforceable unless the sale or some
note or memorandum thereof is in writing and subscribed by the party or
his agent.[6]
Yet again, given the lack of preponderant evidence to prove
the existence of said oral contracts, the query as interposed by
appellants of whether the Statute of Frauds applies in the present
controversy finds no relevance. There is no evidence to prove any aspect
of the execution of the alleged oral contracts of sale, from the
negotiation between the contracting parties, its perfection or birth and
its consummation.[7] There is likewise no proof that the elements of a valid contract, i.e.,
(1) consent or meeting of the minds, that is, consent to transfer
ownership in exchange for the price; (2) determinate subject matter; and
(3) price certain in money or its equivalent,[8] attended the execution of the alleged verbal contracts.
Indeed, what the appellants have presented during the trial
are mere allegations. Needless to state, bare and unsubstantiated
allegations do not constitute substantial evidence and have no probative
value. Allegations which are not supported by any evidence, documentary
or otherwise, sufficient to support a claim, fall short to satisfy the
degree of proof needed.[9]
In the same vein, the arguments that they proffered in the
present appeal are but mere reiteration of these bare allegations. As it
is, appellants’ aforesaid contentions are premised on their allegations
that they had acquired title over the subject land through the
purported oral contracts and that they had actually paid valuable
consideration for the same. However, sans evidence to prove their
veracity, appellants’ heavy reliance on said allegations to support
their proprietary claim is simply misplaced, as they lack factual and
legal basis.
Paling in comparison, the appellees were able to
prove by a preponderance of evidence that the subject land had been part
of the estate of Felipe and Pastora and that the same had been
partitioned by the latter’s heirs. They also presented pieces of
documentary evidence to prove that Antonina had in fact offered and
conveyed to them the land subject matter of the Deed of Absolute Sale.
Besides, appellant Casampol herself served as a witness not only to the
extra-judicial settlement among her kin but also to the execution of
the sale in favor of appellees. She even accompanied her aunt, Antonina
during the negotiation with appellees. Surely, if they had indeed
acquired title over the subject land in its entirety, there is no
plausible explanation or excuse why appellant Casampol would accede and
attest to the disputed transactions in the first place. From the
execution of the subject deeds to the filing of the present case,
appellant Casampol did not contest the genuineness of her signatures in
said deeds. She did not bother to seek judicial relief, which is
expected of a party deprived of property. Clearly, these considerations
are damning evidence of how unmeritorious appellants’ allegations and
contentions are.
We likewise find no persuasion in appellants’
contention that their possession over the subject property should have
alerted appellees of the supposed defect in Antonina’s title and their
proprietary claim over the land. It bears to stress that appellees are
the stepchildren of Florentino, one of the heirs who executed the
extra-judicial settlement and thus familiar with the property and the
relations of those involved therein. Coupled by the fact that appellant
Casampol attested to the partition, appellees have no reason to suspect
Antonina’s title.
What is more, considering that appellants are
children and successors-in-interest of the heirs of the deceased Felipe
and Pastora, appellees are well within reason not to question
appellants’ possession over a portion of the property since appellants
have their a legal right to do so to begin with. This fact however does
not refute the right of Antonina as an heir to sell her portion of the
estate.
We likewise concur with the observation of the trial
court that appellants’ belated claim regarding the purported forgery of
Wilfredo’s signature cannot be taken into consideration since it had not
been substantially established by clear and competent evidence. In this
regard, We quote with approval the disquisition of the trial court in
discarding appellants’ belated claim in so far as it remains irrelevant
to the present controversy. Said the trial court:
“In the case of PRHC vs. LCDC and LCLC vs. PRHC, courts may
rule or decide on matters that, although not submitted as issues, were
proven during trial. However, this issue came out only in the
plaintiff’s memorandum and was neither raised in their amended complaint
nor during the pre-trial conference. Moreover, plaintiffs failed to
substantiate this alleged forgery during the trial and presented the
Certificate of Death of Wilfredo Balmonte only during the formal offer
of their exhibits, which defendants objected for its admission. Hence,
this Court should not have passed upon this issue. However, for purposes
of argument, assuming that the signature of Wilfredo Balmonte as
appearing in the Deed of Extra-judicial Settlement of Estate dated
December 31, 1994, was falsified, this alone will not invalidate the
conveyance of the share of the other heirs over the property subject of
the said deed. The lot which was acquired by the defendants from
Antonina Laron under the Deed of Absolute Sale dated July 2, 1996 has an
area of 297 square meters. The said lot is only a portion of the 594
square meters share of Antonina Laron in the Deed of Extra-judicial
Settlement of Estate dated December 31, 1994. This transaction alone did
not affect the share of the late Wilfredo Balmonte because it was never
the subject of a conveyance in favor of the defendants.”[10]
All told, the present complaint for annulment of documents, as it
is baseless and wanting, clearly deserves outright dismissal. Thus, the
trial court committed no error in dismissing the complaint a quo for lack of merit.
WHEREFORE, the foregoing considered, the present appeal is hereby DISMISSED and the assailed RTC Judgment dated 18 December 2012 AFFIRMED in toto. No costs.
SO ORDERED.
De Guia-Salvador (Chairman) and Garcia, JJ., concur.
[1] Original Records, pp. 206-210.
[2] Id. at pp. 13-15.
[3] Id. at pp. 16-17.
[4] Id. at pp. 22-29, sans annexes.
[5] Spouses Montecalvo vs. Heirs of Eugenia Primero, G.R. No. 165168, 9 July 2010.
[6] Orduña vs. Fuentebella, G.R. No. 176841, 29 June 2010.
[7] Tongson vs. Emergency Pawnshop Bula, Inc., G.R. No. 167874, 15 January 2010.
[8] Article 1318 of the Civil Code of the Philippines.
[9] LNS International Manpower Services vs. Padua, G.R. No. 179792, 5 March 2010.
[10] Pages 4-5 of the Judgment dated 18 December 2012.