PROSPERO SABIDO AND ASER LAGUNDA, PETITIONERS, VS. CARLOS CUSTODIO, BELEN MACABUHAY CUSTODIO AND THE HONORABLE COURT OF APPEALS, RESPONDENTS.

Sabido versus Custodio

The Case

This is the case of Sabido versus Custodio, decided by the Supreme Court in August 1966. Prospero Sabido, the owner of a cargo truck, and Aser Lagunda, its driver, ask the Supreme Court to reverse the Court of Appeals, which had held them liable, together with a passenger bus company and its driver, for the death of a bus passenger named Agripino Custodio. The action is one for damages arising from a vehicular accident, and the petition is one for review by certiorari. The case matters because it is the classic Philippine illustration of how two independent wrongs, one arising from a breach of contract of carriage and the other from a quasi delict, can combine as concurrent proximate causes of a single injury, making the wrongdoers solidarily liable.

Procedural History

The widow, Belen Makabuhay Custodio, and her son Agripino Custodio, Junior, brought suit in the Court of First Instance of Laguna against the Laguna-Tayabas Bus Company, its driver Nicasio Mudales, and the petitioners Prospero Sabido and Aser Lagunda. The trial court found both drivers negligent and sentenced all the defendants to jointly and severally indemnify the plaintiffs in the sum of six thousand pesos, plus the costs of suit. The case was elevated to the Court of Appeals, which affirmed the decision of the trial court in full. Only Sabido and Lagunda came up to the Supreme Court, by petition for review by certiorari. The bus company and its driver did not appeal, so the judgment became final as to them.

Facts

On the morning of June 9, 1955, at about nine thirty, two trucks were traveling in opposite directions along a sharp curve on a bumpy, downward-sloping road in Barrio Halang, Lumban, Laguna. One was a passenger bus of the Laguna-Tayabas Bus Company, driven by Nicasio Mudales and full of passengers. The other was a six-by-six cargo truck driven by Aser Lagunda and owned by Prospero Sabido, climbing the slope with no cargo and no passengers except three helpers, the owner, and the driver.

Agripino Custodio, a passenger on the bus, was hanging on to the left side or running board of the bus because it was full. As the two vehicles met at the curve, the cargo truck sideswiped him, and he was injured and later died.

The trial court found that the bus employees were negligent in allowing Custodio to ride on the running board, and that Lagunda was equally negligent: his truck was running fast, it did not keep close to the right side of the road, and although he saw the hanging passengers while his truck was still five or seven meters away, and could easily have passed over a shallow canal on his right, he did not swerve to avoid them. The Court of Appeals added that the truck was speeding, and that Lagunda himself admitted seeing the hanging passengers at that distance. Both courts concluded that the bus company and its driver had violated the contract of carriage, while Sabido and Lagunda were guilty of a quasi delict.

Issues

• Whether or not the death of Agripino Custodio was due exclusively to the negligence of the carrier and its driver.
• Whether or not the petitioners were themselves guilty of negligence in connection with the accident.
• Whether or not the petitioners may be held solidarily liable with the carrier and its driver, although the latter's liability arises from a breach of contract while the petitioners' springs from a quasi delict.
• Whether or not the complaint against the petitioners should be dismissed.

Applicable Provisions

Section 42 of Act Number 3992, the Revised Motor Vehicle Law, is invoked by the petitioners, who claim the carrier violated it by allowing a passenger to ride on the running board:

Section 42 of Act Number 3992 prohibits any person from riding on the running board, fender, or other exterior part of a motor vehicle not designed for passengers.

The petitioners used this provision to argue that the carrier's violation was the sole proximate cause of the death, an argument the Court rejected because the petitioners' own negligence concurred.

Ruling

On the first two issues, taken together, the Court held that the carrier's negligence was not the exclusive cause. The lower courts had found the petitioners guilty of contributory negligence that was equally a proximate cause: the truck was running at considerable speed while negotiating a sharp curve, and instead of keeping close to its right side it was driven on the middle portion of the road and so near the oncoming bus as to sideswipe a passenger on its running board. The Court stressed that these findings on speed and location are findings of fact that cannot be disturbed in a petition for review by certiorari, and that they are borne out by Lagunda's own testimony that he saw the hanging passengers while the bus was still five or seven meters away, a distance at which he could have avoided them had he not been speeding.

On the third issue, the Court held that solidarity lies despite the different sources of liability. The negligence of the carrier and its driver is independent in its execution from that of the truck driver and owner, yet both are the proximate cause of the death. The carrier's negligence alone would not have produced the result without the petitioners' negligence, and the petitioners' negligence was the last in point of time, so that their truck had what the Court called the last clear chance. The Court adopted the rule of the great weight of authority:

According to the great weight of authority, where the concurrent or successive negligent acts or omission of two or more persons, although acting independently of each other, are, in combination, the direct and proximate cause of a single injury to a third person, and it is impossible to determine in what proportion each contributed to the injury, either is responsible for the whole injury, even tho his act alone might not have caused the entire injury, or the same damage might have resulted from the acts of the other tort-feasor.

On the fourth issue, since the petitioners were negligent and solidarily liable, there was no ground to dismiss the complaint against them.

Doctrine

First, findings of fact of the Court of Appeals, especially on the speed and position of a vehicle, are binding on the Supreme Court in a petition for review by certiorari and will not be disturbed. Second, where the concurrent or successive negligent acts of two or more persons, acting independently, combine as the direct and proximate cause of a single injury, and it is impossible to determine in what proportion each contributed, each is liable for the whole injury. Third, solidarity may arise even though the liabilities rest on different sources, one from a breach of contract of carriage and the other from a quasi delict, because the law looks to the indivisible injury and the concurrence of causes, not to the label of the obligation.

Disposition

The Supreme Court affirmed the decision of the Court of Appeals, with costs against the petitioners, so the petitioners lost and remained solidarily liable with the carrier and its driver.

Remember This

Memorize the line that where independent negligent acts combine as the proximate cause of a single injury and the shares cannot be determined, each tortfeasor answers for the whole. Examiners use this case to test solidarity across a breach of contract and a quasi delict, and the rule that factual findings of the Court of Appeals are conclusive in a petition for review by certiorari.