G.R. No. L-27002. August 27, 1969
EDUARDO VILLANUEVA, FLORITA VILLANUEVA, AGRIPINA VILLANUEVA, ANTONIO VILLANUEVA, SALVACION VILLANUEVA, AURORA VILLANUEVA AND ALESSANDRO VILLANUEVA, PLAINTIFFS-APPELLANTS, VS. PR…
CONCEPCION, C.J.:
Appeal by the plaintiffs from an order of dismissal of the Court
of First Instance of Iloilo.
In their complaint, plaintiffs Eduardo, Florita,
Agripina, Antonio, Salvacion,
Aurora and Alessandro, all surnamed Villanueva, substantially allege:
(a)
that they are the legitimate children and
successors in interest of Alberto Villanueva and Paz Galberion
– hereinafter referred to as Mr. & Mrs. Villanueva – who, during their
lifetime, were the absolute owners of half of a land of about 7.1186 hectares,
situated in Gaud, Cabatuan, Iloilo, more particularly
described in the complaint and designated as Lot No. 2309 of the Cabatuan Cadastre;
(b)
that said lot is a private agricultural land
whose original owner, Jose Jiloca, first mortgaged
and then sold one-half (1/2) thereof to Mr. & Mrs. Villanueva, as evidenced
by a deed of sale in their favor, dated April 28, 1941, copy of which is
attached to the complaint as Annex A;
(c)
that, since April 28, 1941, Mr. & Mrs.
Villanueva had occupied and worked on said land peacefully, continuously,
publicly and adversely to the whole world, as owners thereof, until their demise,
when their children, plaintiffs herein, took over and continued to possess the
land, in the same concept, up to the present;
(d)
that, plaintiff Antonio Villanueva was surprised
when he was summoned in connection with a complaint for unlawful detainer filed, against him and his co-plaintiffs, by
herein defendants Priscilo Portigo
and Fe Tabares – hereinafter referred to as the Portigos -in the municipal court of Cabatuan,
Iloilo;
(e)
that upon a thorough investigation, thereafter,
plaintiffs herein discovered and found that herein defendants Aurora Jiloca – a daughter of Jose Jiloca,
the original owner – and her husband, Juan Perez – both hereinafter referred to
as the Pereces – had surreptitiously applied for a
free patent to said Lot 2309, alleging falsely that the same is a public land,
not claimed by any person, and that said applicants were cultivating the land,
“knowing fully well that these allegations are not true because the
plaintiffs and their predecessors in interest are the ones possessing the land
in question,” (although the annexes attached to the petition suggest that
Mrs. Perez, or Aurora Jiloca, was the only applicant
for a free patent);
(f)
that notice of said free patent application was
never published and, hence, plaintiffs herein had no opportunity to contest
it;
(g)
that, in consequence of said fraudulent acts and
untruthful statements of the Pereces, the Director
of Lands – who is, also, a defendant in this case – was misled into approving
said free patent application and causing to be issued, on June 14, 1956, in
their (Pereces) favor, Free Patent No. V-43391, which
is reproduced in Original Certificate of Title No. 181, copy of which is
attached to the complaint, as Annex C (which shows, however, that the, patent
and OCT No. 181 were issued to “Aurora J. de Perez” only);
(h)
that, being a private land, the one in question
could not have been the subject of an application for free patent, and the
Director of Lands had no authority to cause the same to be issued;
(i)
that, on January
18, 1966, the Pereces fraudulently executed
a deed of sale – copy of which is attached to the complaint as Annex D – of the
land in question to the Portigos – in whose favor
Transfer Certificate of Title No. T-1355, copy of which is attached to the
complaint as Annex B, was issued – who “were very much aware that the
plaintiffs have always been in possession” of said land since the death of
their parents, and that plaintiffs are owners thereof, as evidenced by the
aforementioned deed of conveyance Annex A (Annex D was executed by Aurora J. de
Perez, with the marital consent of her husband);
(j)
that, pretending to act in good faith and in
order to harass the plaintiffs, the Portigos filed
said unlawful detainer case, in the municipal court
of Cabatuan, alleging falsely that plaintiffs herein
were illegally detaining the land in question; and
(k)
that, owing to the foregoing illegal and
fraudulent acts of the Pereces and the Portigos, plaintiffs herein have been constrained to engage
the services of counsel, for which they have to pay P500, as attorney’s fees,
apart from suffering moral damages, in the sum of P7, 000, and incurring actual
expenses in the sum of P300.
Plaintiffs prayed, therefore, that judgment be rendered annulling
said Free Patent No. V-43391 and OCT No. 181, Annex C, as well as the deed of
sale, Annex D, and TCT No. T-1355, Annex B, and that the Pereces
and the Portigos be, moreover, sentenced to pay to
the plaintiffs the abovementioned sums of P7, 000, as moral damages, P500, as
attorney’s fees, and P300, as actual expenses, apart from the costs.
The Director of Lands filed an answer admitting some allegations
of the complaint, denying other allegations thereof and setting up special
defenses. Upon being served with summons; the Pereces
and the Portigos filed a motion to dismiss, alleging:
(1) that “plaintiffs’ action has prescribed”, because Free Patent
No. V-43391 and OCT No. 181, Annex C – in the name of Aurora J. de Perez – were
issued on June 14, 1956, or over ten (10) years before the institution of the
present case, On July 14, 1966;
and (2) that the court had “no jurisdiction over the nature of the action
or suit,” inasmuch as, pursuant to “Section 107, Commonwealth Act No.
141, in relation to Section 122 of Article 496, lands covered by free patent
partakes of the nature of registered land,” so that “Original
Certificate of Title No. 181” issued, in pursuance of Free Patent No.
V-43391, in the name of Aurora J. de Perez, “has become indefeasible in
accordance with law.”
The Court of First Instance of Iloilo granted this motion to
dismiss, not only for the reasons therein set forth, but, also, upon the
additional ground that the present case “amounts to the reversion of Lot
2309 to form again part of the public domain.” A reconsideration of the
order of dismissal having been denied, plaintiffs now seek a review thereof by
record on appeal.
The order of dismissal appealed from is manifestly erroneous. The
present action can not possibly be regarded as an attempt to bring about a
reversion of the lot in question to the public domain, for the simple reason that plaintiffs aver in
their complaint – and this is deemed to be hypothetically admitted by the
motion to dismiss – that said lot is privately owned by them, as it was privately
owned by their parents, Mr. & Mrs. Villanueva, from whom they claim to have
inherited it, and by their parents’ predecessor in interest, Jose Jiloca– father of Mrs. Perez (Aurora Jiloca)
– who (Jose Jiloca) conveyed it to Mr. & Mrs.
Villanueva, on April 28, 1941, pursuant to the deed of sale Annex A. In Baladjay v. Castrillo,[1]
we held, applying previous rulings, that:
” x x x
the legal provision giving the Government the exclusive authority to seek
cancellation of a title issued in conformity with a homestead patent and
reversion of a land to the public domain are, in the very nature of things,
confined in their application to lands of the public domain which have been granted by
virtue of such patent in pursuance of the Public Lands Act. They are
inapplicable to private lands, not even to those acquired by
the Government by purchase for resale to individuals (Marukot
vs. Jacinto, G.R. No. L-80368038, December
29, 1955; Geukeko vs. Araneta,
G.R. No. L-10182, December 24, 1957).
“The defendants herein claim, it is true, that Lot No. 2170 is
part of the public domain. A motion to
dismiss the complaint assumes, however, that its allegations are true, and
plaintiff alleges in her complaint that said lot is her private property. In other words, the complaint does not
indicate that plaintiff had derived his title from the Government or that said
lot had ever been under the jurisdiction or management of the Director of
Lands. Upon the allegations of fact made
in said pleading, plaintiff was not bound, ‘ therefore, to resort to the
administrative remedies provided in the Public Lands Act as a condition
precedent to a judicial recourse for the protection of his alleged rights. Whether plaintiff is capable of proving the
truth of said allegations is another thing. But this is a matter that will have
to be determined after he has had an opportunity to introduce evidence
thereon. It can not be taken up on
motion to dismiss. “
If the land in question was and is of
private ownership, the Director of Lands had no jurisdiction over it, and
neither was it subject to applications for free patent. As a consequence, that
of Aurora J. de Perez should not have been entertained, and said officer had no
authority to approve it, much less to cause to be issued said free patent,
which, accordingly, was null and void ab initio.
The lower court held that the present action “has already
prescribed” because ‘Free Patent No. V-43391 was issued x x on June
14, 1956″ and “became indefeasible after one year from said
date”, whereas the case at bar “was filed on July 14, 1966,” or
over ten (10) years later. This
conclusion is untenable. To begin with,
although Free Patent No. V-43391 is dated June 14, 1956, OCT No. 181 was
not issued until September 28, 1956, when the patent was transcribed in
the Registration Book of the Office of the Register of Deeds for the Province of Iloilo, as
attested to in Annex C and stated in Annex B. Indeed, it is well-settled that
“the act of registration shall be the operative act to convey and affect
the land. “2 Less than ten (10) years had
elapsed from September 28, 1956,
to the institution of this action, on July 14, 1966.
Then, again, plaintiffs herein seek a relief on the ground of fraud. The
corresponding statute of limitations began to run from the accrual of the cause
of action, or “the discovery of the fraud.”3 Such
discovery took place shortly after June
8, 1966, when the Portigos filed the
unlawful detainer case against the plaintiffs. The case at bar was instituted on July 14,
1966, or barely a month later.
Last, but not least, it should be noted that, pursuant to
explicit and repeated averments in the complaint, the Pereces
and the Portigos had acted in bad faith, with full
knowledge of the factual background of the case, particularly of the sale by
Jose Jiloca to Mr. & Mrs. Villanueva, on April
28, 1941, of the public, continuous and adverse possession of the latter,
since that date, as owners of the property, and of the continuation of such
possession, in the same concept, by plaintiffs herein, up to the present. Even
without annulling the two certificates of title involved in this case,
plaintiffs could, therefore, compel the Pereces and
the Portigos to reconvey
the land in question to them (plaintiffs), if the allegations of the complaint
were true.4
The issuance of the patent and of OCT No. 181 in favor of Aurora
J. de Perez, allegedly through fraud on her part, did not annul or even render
ineffective the deed of conveyance executed by her father. Since her title to
the land in question was derived from the latter, said OCT No. 181 vested in
her the title thereto, but merely in trust, for the benefit of the Villanuevas.5 Hence, Article 1456 of the Civil Code of the Philippines
provides that:
“If property is acquired through x x
fraud, the person obtaining it is, by force of law, considered a trustee of
an implied trust for the benefit of the person from whom the property
comes.”6
In short, prima facie, the complaint sets up a cause of action
against the defendants, and plaintiffs are, consequently, entitled to an
opportunity to prove the allegations in their aforementioned pleading.
WHEREFORE, the order appealed from should be, as it is
hereby reversed, and this case is, accordingly, remanded to the lower court for further proceedings consistently
with this decision, with the costs of this instance against the private defendants
herein.
IT IS SO ORDERED.
Dizon, Makalintal,
Zaldivar, Sanchez, Castro, Fernando, Capistrano, Teehankee and Barredo, JJ., concur.
Reyes, J., is on official leave
abroad.
[1]
G.R. No. L-14756, April 26, 1961.
2 Castro v. Auditor
General, G.R. No. L-22403, Oct. 31,
1968; Abuyo v. De Suazo, G.R.
No. L-21202, Oct. 29, 1966;
Guerrero v. Maclang, G.R. No. L-18117, April 27, 1963; Paraiso
v. Camon, 106 Phil. 187; Francisco College,
Inc. v. Panganiban, 106 Phil. 619.
3 Bueno v.
Reyes, G.R. No. L-22587, April 28,
1969; Fabian v. Fabian, G.R. No. L-20449, Jan. 29, 1968; Rosario
v. Auditor General, G.R. No. L-11817, April 30, 1958; Raymundo v.
Afable, 96 Phil. 655; Rone v.
Claro, 91 Phil. 250; Jaen v. Agregado,
G.R. No. L-7921, Sept. 28, 1955.
4 De Ocampo
v. Zaporteza, 53 Phil. 442; Gayondato v. Treasurer of P.I., 49 Phil. 244; Gemora v. F.M. Yap Tico
& Co., 52 Phil. 616; Fabian v. Fabian, supra.
5 Cabanos
v. Register of Deeds, 40 Phil. 620.
6 Underscoring supplied.