LUISA RIVERO IN SUBSTITUTION OF HER DECEASED MOTHER, LUCIA ORIGEN, PETITIONER, VS. THE HON. COURT OF APPEALS (SPECIAL DIVISION OF FIVE JUSTICES) AND JAIME RIVERO, RESPONDENTS.

This is an appeal from the amended decision of the Court of
Appeals in CA-G.R. No. 44488-R, entitled “Lucia Origen
vs. Jaime Rivero” the dispositive
portion of which reads:

“WHEREFORE, finding the motion for reconsideration
meritorious, the judgment dated November
27, 1972 is hereby SET ASIDE and another entered, REVERSING the
decision appealed from.  The Deed of Sale
Exh. A is hereby declared valid and subsisting and
the property subject of said deed of sale and covered by Transfer Certificate
of Title No. T-56789 in the name of Jaime Rivero is
hereby declared to be the rightful property and possession of said Jaime Rivero.  The
complaint of Lucia Origen is hereby DISMISSED.  Motion for Reconsideration is GRANTED.

SO ORDERED.

(SGD) LOURDES P. SAN
DIEGO

WE CONCUR:

(SGD) RUPERTO G. MARTIN

(SGD) LUIS B. REYES”^[1]

On May 3, 1965, Lucia Origen, together
with Cipriano de la Cruz, Leocadia
Rivero, Domingo Rivero and Delfin Jusayan, instituted
against Jaime Rivero in the Court of First Instance
of Bulacan Civil Case No. 136-V to declare null and
void a contract of sale of a parcel of land and Transfer Certificate of Title
No. T-56789 of the Registry of Deeds of Bulacan.^[2]

The complaint^[3]
stated that the deceased Ana Con­cepcion who died on April 18, 1965 was formerly the registered
owner of a certain parcel of land situated at Barrio Tagalag,
Valenzuela, Bulacan, containing an area of 23,245
square meters and was embraced in Transfer Certificate of Title No. T-55814;
that the plaintiffs are some of the legal heirs of the deceased, Ana Concepcion, who died intestate; that on or about March 15,
1965, during her last illness, the deceased decided to mortgage the
above-mentioned property for P5,000.00 so that she could pay her existing
obligation to one Filomena Jusayan
in the amount of P3,000.00 and to spend for her recovery from illness; that she
entrusted the title to her property to the defendant, Jaime Rivero,
trusting that he would facilitate the mortgage; that the defendant did not
mortgage the property but instead, on or about March 25, 1965, when Ana Concepcion was no longer in full possession of her
reasoning faculties, said defendant, through fraud and misrepresentation,
manifesting that certain documents were supposed to be deeds of mortgage of the
above-named property and also through violence and undue influence on Ana Concepcion, effected the signing by the deceased of the
documents which are in reality a deed of absolute sale and an affidavit of
alienation; that the defendant did not give any consideration to Ana Concepcion and, in fact, the deceased died without paying
her debt to Filomena Jusayan,
and said Ana Concepcion lacked proper medical
treatment; that on or about March 26, 1965, the defendant effected the
registration of the property in question in his name and Transfer Certificate
of Title No. T-56789 was issued to him by virtue of the documents signed
through mistake, fraud and violence; that as a consequence of the defendant’s
fraudulent acts and breach of trust, the plaintiffs suffered moral and
exemplary damages amounting to a total of not less than P40,000.00; and that
the plaintiffs were constrained to engage counsel for a fee of P5,000.00.

After his motion to dismiss was denied, the defendant, Jaime Rivero, filed on September 14, 1965 an answer^[4]
wherein he alleged as special and affirmative defenses that the trial court has
no jurisdiction over the subject matter of the action; that the plaintiffs have
no legal capacity to sue; that the claim on which the action is founded is unenforceable
under the Statute of Frauds; that the complaint states no cause of action; that
the suit is between members of the same family and no earnest effort towards a
compromise had been made; that the deed of absolute sale and affidavit of
alienation were executed by Ana Concepcion freely and
voluntarily; and that the defendant has fully paid the consideration of the
said deed of absolute sale and affidavit of alienation.  The defendant interposed a counterclaim for
damages and attorney’s fees.

The trial court rendered its decision dated May 20, 1969, the dispositive
part of which reads:

“WHEREFORE, judgment is hereby rendered:  (1) declaring null and void the deed of sale
purportedly executed by Ana Concepcion on March 24,
1965, and acknowledged before notary public Irineo Guardiano and entered in the latter’s nota­rial
register as Doc. No. 257, Page 53, Book X, Series of 1950, and the sworn
affidavit executed by her on March 25, 1965 in connection with said alleged
sale; (2) ordering the cancellation of T.C.T. No. T-56789 and Tax Declaration
No. 15219, both in the name of Jaime Rivero; and the
restitution of the previous certificate of title and tax declaration in the
name of Ana Concepcion; (3) declaring the land
covered by said certificate of title and tax declaration to be the pro­perty of
the estate of Ana Concepcion which should be settled
in the appropriate special proceedings; and (4) reserving the right to Jaime Rivero to file his claim in said special proceedings for
the amounts he paid to settle the obligations of Ana Concepcion
in favor of Filomeno Zamora and Crisanto
Origen.

Costs against the defendant.

SO ORDERED.

Valenzuela, Bulacan,
May 20, 1969.

JUAN DE BORJA

Judge”^[5]

The defendant appealed to the Court of Appeals where the case was
docketed as CA-G.R. No. 44488-R.

At first, the Court of Appeals promulgated a decision on November 27, 1972 written by Acting
Presiding Justice Juan P. Enriquez and concurred in by Justice Juan O. Reyes
and Justice Luis B. Reyes affirming in toto
the decision of the trial court.^[6]
Justice Lourdes P. San Diego and Jus­tice Eloy B. Bello dissented in a separate opinion.^[7]

Upon a motion for reconsideration filed by the defendant, the
Court of Appeals promulgated on May 4, 1973 an amended decision written by
Justice Lourdes P. San Diego and concurred in by Justice Ruperto
G. Martin and Justice Luis P. Reyes reversing the decision of the trial court
appealed from and declaring the deed of sale, Exhibit A, valid and subsisting
and the property covered by Transfer Certificate of Title No. T-56789 as the
rightful property of Jaime Rivero.^[8]
Acting Presiding Justice Juan P. En­riquez dissented in a separate opinion
concurred in by Justice Juan O. Reyes.^[9]

The present petitioner, Luisa Rivero,
was substituted for her deceased mother, Lucia Origen.

The petitioner assigns the following errors:

“I

THE HONORABLE COURT OF APPEALS ERRED IN HOLDING THAT ‘THE ADMISSION
BY PLAINTIFF-APPELLEE IN HER VERIFIED COMPLAINT THAT THE SIGNATURE OF ANA CONCEPCION
ON THE DEED OF SALE AS WELL AS IN EXHIBIT ‘B’ OR ‘5’ IS GENUINE PARTAKES OF THE
NATURE OF A JUDICIAL ADMISSION WHICH, UNDER THE PROVISION OF SEC. 2, RULE 129,
CANNOT BE CONTRADICTED AND ALL CONTRADICTORY PROOF SUBMITTED BY THE PARTY
MAKING SUCH JUDICIAL ADMISSION OR INCONSISTENT THEREWITH MUST BE IGNORED BY THE
COURTS WHETHER OBJECTED TO OR NOT BY THE OPPOSING PARTY.’

II

THE HONORABLE COURT OF APPEALS ERRED IN HOLDING THAT THE ‘TESTIMONY
OF MAJOR CATA­LINO F. FERNANDEZ, ALLEGED HANDWRITING EXPERT, TO THE EFFECT THAT
ANA CONCEPCION’S SIGNATURE WAS FORGED, AND ON WHOSE TESTIMONY THE LOWER
COURT AND THE MAJORITY OF THIS DIVI­SION RELIED
UPON IN THEIR RES­PECTIVE DECISIONS, CANNOT AND SHOULD NOT HAVE BEEN
CONSIDERED.’

III

THE HONORABLE COURT OF APPEALS ERRED IN HOLDING ‘THAT NEITHER SEC.
5 RULE 10 NOR THE MARELLA CASE CAN APPLY IN THE CASE INASMUCH AS SAID SECTION
CONTEMPLATES ONLY EVIDENCE CONSISTENT WITH AND MADE TO SUPPORT THE ALLEGATIONS
OF A COMPLAINT AND DEFINITELY NOT EVIDENCE CONTRADICTORY TO ALLEGATIONS STATED
IN THE COMPLAINT.’

IV

THE HONORABLE COURT OF APPEALS ERRED IN HOLDING THAT ‘WE DO NOT
FIND ANY PROOF, NAY NOT EVEN THE SLIGHTEST SUGGESTION ON THE PART OF THE
PLAINTIFF THAT THIS PARTICULAR ALLEGATION IN THE COMPLAINT WAS MADE THRU PALPABLE
MISTAKE.’

V

THE HONORABLE COURT OF APPEALS ERRED IN HOLDING THAT ‘WE ARE OF THE
CONSIDERED OPINION THAT THE REASONING EVOLVED IN THE DISSENTING OPINION OF THE
LATE JUSTICE E. BELLO THOROUGHLY SUPPORTS THE VIEW THAT A PUBLIC DOCUMENT
ENJOYS IN ITS FAVOR THE PRESUMPTION THAT THE CON­TENTS THEREOF ARE TRUE AND
THAT THE SAID PUBLIC DOCUMENT HAS BEEN EXECUTED ACCORDING TO LAW, WHICH PRE­SUMPTION,
ALTHOUGH DISPUTABLE, WILL NOT BE DISCARDED EXCEPT BY OVERWHELMING EVIDENCE TO
THE CONTRARY.  THIS QUANTUM OF EVIDENCE
WE DO NOT
FIND IN THE CASE UNDER CONSIDERATION.’

VI

FINALLY, THE HONORABLE COURT OF APPEALS ERRED IN REVERSING THE
DECISION OF THE LOWER COURT
AND IN RULING THAT ‘THE DEED OF SALE
EXHIBIT ‘A’ IS HEREBY DECLARED VALID AND SUBSISTING AND THE PROPERTY SUBJECT OF
SAID DEED OF SALE AND COVERED BY
TRANSFER CERTIFICATE NO. T-56789 IN THE NAME OF JAIME RIVERO IS HEREBY DECLARED
TO BE THE RIGHTFUL PROPERTY AND POSSESSION OF SAID JAIME RIVERO.”^[10]

Despite the number of errors assigned, the principal issue is the
validity of the deed of sale, Exhibit A.

The record discloses that Ana Concepcion
was the only daughter of Vicente Concepcion who died
in 1934; that Ana Concepcion inherited from her
father a parcel of land which is the subject of the present controversy; that
Ana Concepcion was afflicted with pulmonary
tuberculosis and as she needed money for her treatment, she requested her
nephew, Jaime Rivero, to work for the transfer of the
title of the land in question to her; that on January 20, 1965, through the
efforts of Jaime Rivero, Transfer Certificate of
Title No. T-55814 embracing said land was issued in the name of Ana Concepcion; that Transfer Certificate of Title No. T-55814
was never delivered by Jaime Rivero to Ana Concepcion until she died; that not long after the death of
Ana Concepcion on April 18, 1968, the relatives of
the deceased discovered that the land of Ana Concepcion
had been registered in the name of Jaime Rivero who
secured Transfer Certificate of Title No. 56789 in his name from the Register
of Deeds of Bulacan; and that a deed entitled “Kasulatan Sa Ganap Na Bilihan” dated March 24, 1965, whereby it was made to
appear that Ana Concepcion had sold to Jaime Rivero the land in question, was allegedly concocted by
Jaime Rivero, taking advantage of his being in
possession of the certificate of title of Ana Concepcion.^[11]

The evidence of the plaintiffs on the issue of forgery consisted
of the testimony of Major Catalino F. Hernandez who
was presented as a handwriting expert. 
Major Hernandez declared that he made a study of the authenticity and
genuineness of the signature of Ana Concepcion on the
deed of sale, Exhibit A, by comparing it with the signatures of Ana Concepcion appearing in four (4) documents admittedly
signed by her.  The standards used by the
handwriting expert are the sworn statement dated March 25, 1965, Exhibit B; the
affidavit of adjudication dated January
20, 1965, Exhibit C; the option to sell dated October 5, 1958; and the voter’s affidavit and
list of voters for the election of 1955 which contain the signature of Ana Concepcion.

The testimony of Major Catalino F.
Hernandez that the deed of sale was a forgery was not contradicted by evi­dence
of the defendant.  According to said
handwriting expert, the signature in the deed of sale, Exhibit A, shows irregu­lar,
tremulous, hesitating and corrective strokes. 
It is written with a drawing movement, unlike the standard signa­tures
where the movement is fluent.  The
handwriting charac­teristics are dissimilar. 
Based on these dissimilarities, Major Hernandez concluded that the
signature on the deed of sale, Exhibit A, was not written by Ana Concepcion.^[12]

The trial court, although desisting from calling the deed of
sale, Exhibit A, a forgery, found that the consent of Ana Concepcion
was obtained through fraudulent misrepresentation of Jaime Rivero
because:

“This Court, for one, is not infallible, and will desist from
calling Exhibit A a forgery to avoid the risk of passing
erroneous judgment on people who might otherwise be innocent.  But even on the assumption that the document
was in fact signed by Ana Concepcion, the Court finds
that it could not have been her intention to sell the land to Rivero.

Ana Concepcion was illiterate.  She could sign her name with difficulty.  Luisa Rivero, who
attended her, studied only up to grade school, and the two of them could not
have understood the meaning and import of the documents Ana Concepcion
was made to sign.  But the latter knew
the value of her property as far back as 1958, for in that year she gave an
option to sell it for P4.50 per square meter (Exh.
D), which is more than P100,000.00 for the whole area.  She could readily have sold it for perhaps
less than that amount at any time.  But
instead of doing so she only borrowed P2,623.00 from Filomena
Zamora (Exh. 19) and P450.00 from Crisanto
Origen (Exh. 20).  This can only mean that she did not want to
sell the property for less than its actual value.  On March
25, 1965 she was already gravely ill and in need of funds.  Yet why should she be willing to sell the
land for P5,000.00, when she well knew that she could get P100,000.00 for
it?  In this situation, it is not difficult
to believe the testimony of Luisa Rivero that what
the old woman wanted was to mortgage the property in order to pay off her debts
and have ready funds.  By the same token
she could not have agreed to sell the land to Rivero
for P5,000.00.  If she signed the deed of
sale and subsequent affidavit, it was under the false belief that she was only
mortgaging the property.  The sale is
therefore voidable, because the consent of Ana Concepcion was obtained thru the fraudulent
misrepresentation of Rivero that the contract she was
signing was one of mortgage (Art. 1330, N.C.C.).

‘In determining whether consent is vitiated by any of the
circumstances mentioned in this article, courts are given a wide latitude in
weighing a the facts or circumstances in a given case and in deciding in favor
of what they believe to have actually occurred, considering the age, physical infirmity,
intelligence, relationship, and the conduct of the parties at the time of
making the contract and sub­sequent thereto, irrespective of whether the
contract is in a public or private writing.’ (Trasporto
vs. Beltran, C.A.
51 O.G. 1434.)”^[13]

The undisputed facts of record support the finding of the trial
court that the consent of Ana Concepcion to the deed
of sale was obtained through the fraudulent misrepresentation of Jaime Rivero that the contract she was signing was one of
mortgage.

The land in question is located in the Municipality
of Polo, Bulacan,
very near Manila.  It has an area of 2 hectares, 32 ares and 45 centares.  The consideration for the sale of said land
is only P5,000.00 which is not only grossly inadequate but shocking to the conscience.  The land in question was sold for less than
P0.25 per square meter.

It appears that Ana Concepcion only
wanted to mortgage the property so she could pay her indebtedness of about
P3,000.00.  Considering the nature of the
area of the property, the same can be sold for about P100,000.00.  In 1958 Ana Concepcion
had executed an option to sell the land in question for a price of P4.50 per
square meter.  It appears from the
description of the land in question that the same is a corner lot being bounded
on the south and west by a road 3 meters wide.^[14]

In view of the foregoing, we find that Ana Concepcion
signed the alleged deed of sale, Exhibit A, thinking that the same was merely a
mortgage of the land in question.

WHEREFORE, the amended decision of the Court of Appeals
promulgated on May 4, 1973
in CA-G.R. No. 44488-R is hereby reversed and the decision of the trial court
is affirmed in toto, with costs against
the private respondent Jaime Rivero.

SO ORDERED.

Teehankee, (Chairman), Makasiar, Muñoz Palma, and Guerrero, JJ., concur.

Martin, J., did not take part.

^[1] Rollo, p. 164. 
Justice Lourdes P. San Diego wrote the decision and was concurred in by
Justice Ruperto G. Martin and Justice Luis B.
Reyes.  Acting Presiding Justice Juan P.
Enriquez dissented in a separate opinion concurred in by Justice Juan O. Reyes.

^[2] Rollo, pp. 111-112.

^[3]
Record on Appeal, pp. 2-5, Rollo, p. 171.

^[4] Ibid.,
pp. 20-24, Rollo, p. 171.

^[5] Ibid.,
pp. 40-41, Rollo, p. 171.

^[6] Rollo, pp. 111-127.

^[7] Rollo, pp. 128-142.

^[8] Rollo, pp. 158-164.

^[9] Rollo, pp. 165-169.

^[10]
Brief for Petitioner, pp. A-C, Rollo, p. 183.

^[11] Rollo, pp. 114-116.

^[12]
Record on Appeal, pp. 31-32, Rollo, p. 171.

^[13]
Record on Appeal, pp. 38-40, Rollo, p. 171.

^[14] Ibid.,
p. 3, Rollo, p. 171.