PABLO INDICO, PETITIONER, VS. NATIVIDAD PARCON AS JUSTICE OF THE PEACE OF JANIUAY, F. IMPERIAL REYES, JUDGE OF FIRST INSTANCE OF ILOILO, AND BASILISA TIRADOR, RESPONDENTS.

Pablo Indico, the present petitioner, filed an Application for certiorari in
the Court of First Instance of Iloilo seeking, on the ground of alleged lack tor
excess of jurisdiction, the setting aside of a decision and an order of
execution handed down and issued of the justice of the peace of Janiuay, Iloilo,
in an action for forcible entry and detainer. That petition having been denied,
he comes to this Court setting forth the same facts as his cause of action and
praying for the same relief. The present petition is a substantial reproduction
of the dismissed petition with the sole difference that now, the Judge of First
Instance, Honorable F. Imperial Reyes, is made defendant and his decision is
added to the justice of the peace’s decision and order sought to be brought up
for examination.

It is evident that the decision and order of execution of the justice of the
peace cannot be reviewed by certiorari after the first petition to obtain the
same relief has been thrown away. This question is res judicata. It is
likewise evident that certiorari does not lie against Judge Reyes’ decision.
Appeal would be the appropriate Redress against the latter decision. Certiorari
is not a substitute for appeal unless it appears that appeal does not afford
adequate and complete remedy. Countenance of the step taken by the petitioner
would result in the anomaly that a petition for the writ of certiorari could be repeated as many times as there were courts of different grades, in the
order of their rank. An unsuccesssful attempt, say, in the Court of Appeals, if
a petition could be filed in that court, could be reiterated in the Supreme
Court.

Such procedure would have to rest on the theory that the court which took
cognizance of the first petition had no jurisdiction to entertain it, when in
fact the petitioner himself invoked such jurisdiction and set the court In
motion. The subsequent petition or petitions become doubly incongruous when
account is taken of fact that, as in this case, the original petition ring been
dismissed and no affirmative action having teen taken, the proceeding of the
latter court cannot, in the nature of things, suffer from the infirmity of being
wholly or partly outside that court’s jurisdiction.

The petition is dismissed with costs.

Parás, Feria, Perfecto, and
Bengzon, JJ., concur.