LINO P. BERNARDO, PETITIONER, VS. EUFEMIA PASCUAL, ET AL., AND WORKMEN’S COMPENSATION COMMISSION, RESPONDENTS.

Bernardo versus Pascual

The Case

This is Bernardo versus Pascual, a petition to review on certiorari a decision of the Workmen's Compensation Commission. Lino P. Bernardo, a timber concessionaire and the owner and operator of a sawmill, resists an award of compensation to the widow and children of Pedro Pascual, who died after an accident while felling a tree inside the concession. The case matters because it gathers in one decision three questions that recur in labor and remedial law: how an employer-employee relation is proved in a compensation proceeding, when an amended claim relates back to the original claim for purposes of the prescriptive period, and when a person who later becomes sole concessionaire answers for the obligations of the partnership that preceded him.

Procedural History

The widow of the deceased filed a claim for compensation with the Workmen's Compensation Commission, originally against the Bernardo Sawmill. The claim was later amended to include Lino P. Bernardo, the timber concessionaire and owner and operator of the sawmill, as party respondent. The referee assigned to hear the case denied the claim. The claimants petitioned for review, and the reviewing commissioner reversed the referee, ordering Bernardo to pay compensation, to reimburse burial expenses, and to pay fees to the Workmen's Compensation Fund. Reconsideration was denied, and Bernardo brought the present petition for certiorari before the Supreme Court.

Facts

On the ninth of March, 1955, Pedro Pascual was in the woods at Corona, San Miguel, Bulacan, together with Rogelio Bacane and Martin Quinto. Bacane and Quinto, both loggers admittedly in the employ of Bernardo, were cutting timber. Fifty meters away, Pascual was felling a tree that he had begun hewing three days before.

When Bacane and Quinto heard the sound of the falling tree, they shouted to Pascual, following the practice among loggers, to ask if he was alright. He did not answer. They rushed to him and found him prostrate on the ground with blood trickling from his mouth. He died shortly thereafter from a fractured skull, and his companions brought his body home in Bernardo's truck.

The widow testified, in effect, that the deceased, Bacane and Quinto used to receive their wages from Emilio Bautista, Bernardo's caretaker, and that she herself received from Bautista the wages corresponding to her husband's last services. Bernardo denied any employer-employee relation and claimed that Bautista was a government forest guard, not his employee. He also asserted that he became a timber concessionaire only on the thirteenth of October, 1955, and objected that the claim had prescribed.

Issues

• Whether or not the Workmen's Compensation Commission abused its discretion in reversing the referee and finding that the deceased was an employee of the petitioner.
• Whether or not the claim was filed out of time and therefore already barred.
• Whether or not the petitioner may escape liability on the ground that he became a lumber concessionaire only on the thirteenth of October, 1955.

Applicable Provisions

Section 2 of Rule 3 of the Rules of Court provides:

Every action must be prosecuted in the name of the real party in interest.

The Court uses this rule to hold that the amended claim, which merely specified the real party in interest, relates back to the date of the original claim.

Article 1840 of the new Civil Code provides:

All partners, including industrial ones, shall be liable pro rata with all their property and after all the partnership assets have been exhausted, for the contracts which may be entered into in the name and for the account of the partnership, under its signature and by a person authorized to act for the partnership. However, any partner may enter into a separate obligation to perform a partnership contract.

The Court invokes this provision to hold that the petitioner, having acquired the interests of his partners and become sole concessionaire, became liable to the creditors of the partnership.

Ruling

On the first issue, the Court held that there was no abuse of discretion. Bacane and Quinto, whose employment with the petitioner was never denied and who were working with the deceased when he died, testified that the deceased was their co-laborer in the lumber concession. Their testimonies, the Commission found, clearly point to the existence of an employer-employee relation. The claim that Bautista was a government forest guard does not defeat liability, because forest guards hired by lumber concessionaires, though appointed by the Department of Agriculture and Natural Resources, are still deemed employees of the concessionaires. The Court also rejected as reckless the accusation that the deceased was a lumber smuggler, noting that no explanation was given why he was felling a tree in broad daylight in the presence of the petitioner's two loggers. Finally, the finding that the deceased was the petitioner's employee is a finding of fact, and absent a sufficient showing that it is unsupported by substantial evidence, it is final and conclusive upon the Court.

On the second issue, the Court held that the claim was not barred. The original claim was filed on the thirty-first of March, 1955, within the three-month period from the death of the employee fixed by Section 24 of the Workmen's Compensation Act. The amendment of the sixth of February, 1956 merely specified the real party in interest in accordance with the rule that every action must be prosecuted in the name of such party in interest. Since the amendment did not state a new cause of action but merely made more determinate the real party respondent, it relates back to the date of the original claim.

On the third issue, the Court held that the petitioner's claim of late concession did not exculpate him. Before the thirteenth of October, 1955, he was a partner with several persons owning the concession in San Miguel, Bulacan, and afterwards he acquired the interest of his partners and became sole concessionaire. Under those circumstances, he became liable to the creditors of the partnership.

Doctrine

First, the existence of an employer-employee relation is a question of fact, and a finding of the Workmen's Compensation Commission thereon, supported by substantial evidence, is final and conclusive upon the Supreme Court. Second, forest guards hired by lumber concessionaires, though appointed by the Department of Agriculture and Natural Resources, are deemed employees of the concessionaires. Third, an amendment that does not state a new cause of action but merely specifies the real party in interest under Section 2 of Rule 3 relates back to the date of the original claim, so that a claim timely filed against the business is timely as against the person who owns and operates it. Fourth, a partner who acquires the interests of his co-partners and becomes sole concessionaire becomes liable to the creditors of the partnership under Article 1840 of the new Civil Code.

Disposition

The Court affirmed the decision of the Workmen's Compensation Commission, with costs, so that the widow and children of Pedro Pascual prevailed and Lino P. Bernardo was ordered to pay the compensation, the burial expenses, and the fees to the Workmen's Compensation Fund.

Remember This

The line worth memorizing is that an amendment specifying the real party in interest does not state a new cause of action and relates back to the original claim. Examiners use this case for the relation-back rule in remedial law and for the deemed-employment of forest guards in labor and social legislation.