N. M. BALUYOT & CO., PETITIONER, VS. ANTONIO TY, HON. FELIX DOMINGO, PRESIDING JUDGE OF THE COURT OF FIRST INSTANCE OF MANILA, BRANCH XV, AND UNION TEXTILE CORPORATION, RESPONDE…

N. M. Baluyot & Co., in a verified petition for certiorari,
prohibition and/or mandamus, alleges:

That on April 28, 1967 respondent Antonio Ty and the Union Textile Corporation, hereinafter referred to as
UTC entered into a written agreement whereby the latter, for a period of one
year, undertook to manufacture, sell and deliver, and the former undertook to
buy all the textile products of UTC; that on April 18, 1968 the Chair­man of
the Executive Committee of UTC reminded Ty in writ­ing
that their agreement would expire at the end of said month, and was invited to
submit the terms and conditions under which he would like the same to be
renewed; that on April 24 of the same year Ty
submitted to UTC his terms and conditions for a new contract; that in two letters
dated April 22 and May 8, 1968, respectively, petitioner also offered in
writing to enter into a sole buyership agreement with
UTC under the terms and conditions set forth therein, which offer was the one
accepted by the Board of Directors of UTC on May 14, 1968; that the execution
of said sole buyership contract scheduled on June 6, 1968 could not be carried out
because two days before Ty had filed with the Court
of First Instance of Manila, Branch II, presided by the Honorable Judge Jose Leuterio Civil Case No. 73189 where, upon his petition,
Judge Leuterio issued an order restraining the UTC
from (a) entering into any sole buyership contract
with any party other than Ty, and (b) from selling
and delivering textile goods and yarns manufactured
by it, and to continue manufacturing, selling and delivering its textile goods
and yarns to Ty alone; that herein peti­tioner, with
previous leave of court, intervened in said Civil Case No. 73189 and filed its
opposition to the is­suance of the writ of preliminary injunction prayed for by
Ty in his petition; that although at the hearing upon
the petition for injunction held on June 19, 1968, Ty
presented no evidence whatsoever while herein petitioner presented do­cumentary
evidence to show that Ty’s cause of action, as set forth
in his petition, was not free from doubt and dispute and that he was not,
therefore, entitled to the injunction prayed for therein, Judge Leuterio, completely disregarding the circumstances just
referred to, issued the preliminary injunction prayed for in Ty’s petition upon the filing and approval of a bond in the
sum of P30,000; that the writ thus issued prevented the implementation or
consummation of the sole buyership award made by the
UTC to herein petitioner; that petitioner, on June 29, 1968, filed with the
Court of Appeals a petition for certiorari, with a prayer for the is­suance of a writ of preliminary injunction
against Judge Leuterio and Antonio Ty (C.A.-G.R. No. 41449-R) in which case, on July 3, 1968
said Court issued an order restraining the respondents therein from enforcing
or executing the order and/or writ of the respondent judge of June 22, 1968 men­tioned
heretofore, which restraining order was subsequently confirmed by the Court of
Appeals in its resolution of July 12, 1968 granting the writ of preliminary
injunction prayed for in the basic petition filed in said case; that after receiving notice of
the restraining order issued by the Court of Appeals on July 3, 1968 as just
mentioned, Ty filed on July 6, 1968 another action
against UTC (Case No. 73530) covering the same subject matter involved in Civil
Case No. 73189 pending before the Honorable Judge Leuterio,
this new action having been assigned to Branch XV of the same Court of First
Instance of Manila presided by the herein respondent Judge Felix Domingo; that
the com­plaint in this Civil Case No. 73530 was for specific per­formance and
damages for an amount in excess of nearly P5,000,000 with a prayer for the
issuance of a writ of preliminary injunction, and it alleged that UTC had made
short deliveries of fabrics and yarns called for under its agreement with Ty of April 28, 1967 because it had sold said fabrics and
yarns to third parties in violation of said agreement; that pursuant to the
petition made in said complaint the respondent judge issued on July 9, 1968 the
order prayed for therein restraining the therein defendant, during the pendency of the case, from selling and delivering to third
persons other than Ty all its present stocks of
fabrics and yarns including those to be manufactured and produced, until such
time that said defendant would have fully complied with its contractual
obligation with Ty; that herein petitioner was
likewise allowed to intervene in said case (Civil Case No. 73530) by order of
the Court of July 30, 1968 and promptly filed therein its opposition to the
issuance of a writ of pre­liminary injunction; that the respondent judge in his
res­training order of July 9, 1968 set the hearing of the pe­tition for a writ
of preliminary injunction on July 13, 1968 at 8:30 a.m.; that on petition of Ty said hearing was cancelled and reset on August 6, 1968,
over the objection of herein petitioner – intervenor
in said case; that this hearing set for August 6, 1968 upon motion of Ty again, was postponed to August 22, 1968, over the
objection of herein petitioner; that on August 22, 1968 Ty
again moved to postpone the hearing upon some other ground and again the
respondent judge granted the postponement and reset the hearing on the incident
on August 26, 1968; that this hearing set for August 26, 1968 was again
postponed, but this time upon an ex-parte motion
filed by UTC, defendant in said case, and the hearing on the incident was again
reset for October 7, 1968; that before said hearing on October 7, 1968, Ty again filed a motion for the postpone­ment of the
hearing upon the ground that the evidence he would present would form part of
the evidence he would produce during the trial on the merits, and the
respondent judge not only granted again the postponement in his order of
October 5, 1968 but also set the hearing of the petition for preliminary
injunction simultaneously with the trial of the case on the merits, in this
manner maintaining indefinitely the injurious effects of
the restraining order previously issued by him without bond.

The facts set forth above, alleged under oath in the petition
before Us, clearly show arbitrariness and grave abuse of discretion on the part
of the respondent judge, considering first, that the obvious effect of said restrain­ing order – issued
without bond – is to circumvent and nullify the preliminary injunction issued
by the Court of Appeals in CA-G.R. No. 41449 involving the same parties and
subject matter; second, that the repeated and un­justified postponements of the
hearing on the petition for the issuance of a writ of preliminary injunction
were clearly intended to delay a definite resolution thereof thus allowing the
prejudicial effects of the restraining order issued by the respondent judge
without bond to continue; and lastly, that the setting of the hearing on said
petition simultaneously with the trial of the case on the merits – a proceeding
that, judging from the issues involved in the case – will be long and
protracted – will result in nothing else but the con­tinued enforcement of said
restraining order for an indefinite period of time, contrary to the usual
practice of issuing orders of such nature to be effective only for a short and
definite period of time.

However, under the recent
amendments to Section 29 of the Judiciary Act of 1948, the writs of certiorari,
prohibition and mandamus prayed for in the petition under consideration are in
aid of the appellate jurisdiction of the Court of Appeals over the main case –
Civil Case No. 73530 – pending before the respondent judge.

In Breslin et al. vs. Luzon Stevedoring
Company, et al. (47 O.G. No. 3, pp. 1170-1175) We held that this court has also
original jurisdiction to entertain special civil actions for the issuance of a
writ of certiorari, prohibition or mandamus because the Court of Appeals’
original jurisdiction to issue said writs in aid of its appellate jurisdiction
is not exclusive.  This notwith­standing,
the policy heretofore consistently adhered to by this Court in situations like
the present is to require that petitions similar to the one under consideration
should be filed with the Court of Appeals, this Court re­serving for itself the
power to review, in accordance with law, whatever final judgments or orders are
rendered or issued therein by the latter.

Consequently, We are
constrained to dismiss this case but without prejudice to the filing of the
corres­ponding petition with the Court of Appeals.

Concepcion, C.J., Reyes, J.B.L., Makalintal, Zaldivar, Sanchez,
Fernando, and Capistrano, JJ., concur.

Castro, J., did not take part.