FORTUNATA MERCADO, BASILIA CUEVAS MERCADO, SOTERA MERCADO AND TRINIDAD MERCADO, PETITIONERS, VS. HON. ALBERTO Q. UBAY, AS PRESIDING JUDGE OF THE COURT OF FIRST INSTANCE OF RIZAL…

This is a petition for certiorari and prohibition under
Rule 65 of the Revised Rules of Court with a prayer for the issuance of a writ
of preliminary injunction.  Petitioners
seek to enjoin and restrain respondent judge from further proceeding with Civil
Case No. C-2442 in the Court of First Instance of Rizal
(now Regional Trial Court) on the ground of lack of jurisdiction to annul a final
and executory judgment rendered by the Court of First
Instance of Cavite (now Regional Trial Court) in
Civil Case No. TM-223.

The antecedent facts are as follows:

On May 18, 1966,
petitioners filed an action for partition with the Court of First Instance of Cavite, Branch I, docketed as Civil Case No. TM-223,
against Antonio, Ely and respondents Lucina and Trinidad, all surnamed
Samonte and who are brothers and sisters.

On June 27, 1966,
the defendants were served with a copy of the complaint and summons thru their
co­-defendant Antonio Samonte who acknowledged
receipt thereof.

On July 11, 1966,
all the defendants in the above-numbered case, thru counsel, Atty. Danilo Pine, filed their answer to the complaint.  Later, on January 4, 1967, the said defendants, thru the same
counsel, filed their amended answer.

On July 31, 1970,
the Court of First Instance of Cavite (now RTC)
rendered judgment in favor of the petitioners and against all the defendants in
the civil case, including
private respondents.  Since no appeal was
made by any of the defendants from the decision of the trial court, the same
became final and executory and the court issued the
corresponding writ of execution.

However, before the writ could be carried out by the provincial
sheriff, all the defendants, thru the same counsel, Atty. Danilo
Pine, filed a petition for certiorari and mandamus with the Court
of Appeals seeking to annul the writ of execution issued by the trial court in Cavite in Case No. TM-223.  On July
9, 1971, the Court of Appeals dismissed the petition for lack of
merit.

On May 27, 1972,
respondents Lucina Samonte
and Trinidad Samonte brought an action before the
Court of First Instance of Rizal (now RTC) docketed
as Case No. C-2442,
for the annulment of the final judgment rendered by the trial court in Cavite in Case No. TM-223, alleging the following matters:  that they did not authorize anyone including
Atty. Danilo Pine to file an answer in their behalf
as defendants in Case No. TM-223, and that the filing of the petition for certiorari
with the Court of Appeals to annul the writ of execution in the same case was
without their knowledge and participation.

Petitioners’ motion to dismiss the action was denied by the CFI
of Rizal. 
Thus, the instant petition was
filed.

The issue to be resolved in this case is whether or not the Court
of First Instance of Rizal (now RTC) committed grave
abuse of discretion or acted without jurisdiction in denying the petitioners’ motion to
dismiss the action for annulment of the final and executory
judgment rendered by the CFI of Cavite.

The applicable law is Republic Act No. 296, as amended, otherwise
known as “The Judiciary Act of 1948,” which was the law in force when the disputed action for annulment was filed on May 27, 1972 in the CFI of Rizal.  This is based on the principle that the facts
alleged in the complaint and the law in force at the time of commencement of
action determine the jurisdiction of a court (Lum
Bing v. Ibañez, 92 Phil. 799; Rodriguez v. Pecson, 92 Phil. 172; Salao v. Crisostomo, No. L-29146, August 5, 1985, 138 SCRA 17; Tolentino v. Social
Security Commission, No. L-28870, September 6, 1985, 138 SCRA 428;
Philippine Overseas Drilling, etc. v. Minister of Labor, G.R. No. 55703,
November 27, 1986, 146 SCRA 79).

Section 44(a) of the Revised Judiciary Act of 1948 then vested
original jurisdiction in the Courts of First Instance over all civil actions in
which the subject of the litigation is not capable of pecuniary estimation and
an action for the annulment of a judgment and
an order of a court of justice belongs to this category (Vda. de Ursua v. Pelayo, 107 Phil.
622).  A court of first instance or a
branch thereof has the authority and the jurisdiction as provided for by law to
annul a final and executory judgment rendered by
another court of first instance or by another branch of the same court.  This
was the ruling laid down in the cases of Dulap v.
Court of Appeals, No. L-28306, December 18, 1971, 42 SCRA 537; Gianan v. Imperial, No.
L-37963, February 28, 1974, 55 SCRA 755
and Francisco v. Aquino, Nos. L-33235-36, July 29, 1976, 72 SCRA 149 which
overturned the contrary rulings in Mas v. Dumara-og,
No. L-16252, September 29, 1964, 12 SCRA 34; J.M. Tuason & Co. v. Torres, et al., No.
L-24717, December 4, 1967, 21 SCRA
1169; and Sterling Investment Corporation, et al. v. Ruiz, etc., et al., No.
L-30694, October 31, 1969, 30 SCRA
318).  Thus, in an action to annul
a final judgment or order, the choice of which court the action should be filed
is not left to the parties; by legal mandate the action should be filed with
the Court of First Instance.  The
question is in what place (with what particular court of first instance) the
action should be commenced and tried (Dulap, supra).  The issue therefore to be resolved in the
instant case is not one of jurisdiction but of venue–whether it was properly
laid in the Court of First Instance of Rizal for the
annulment of the judgment rendered by the CFI of Cavite.

Section 2, Rule 4 of the Rules of Court fixes the venue in Courts
of First Instance, as follows:

“SEC. 2. 
Venue in Courts of First Instance– (a) Real actions.  — Actions affecting title to, or for
recovery of possession, or for partition or condemnation of, or foreclosure of
mortgage on, real property, shall be commenced and tried in the province where
the property or any part thereof lies.

“(b) Personal actions.  — All other actions may be commenced and
tried where the defendant or any of the defendants resides or may be found, or
where the plaintiff or any of the plaintiffs resides, at the election of the
plaintiff.

“x x x.”

The complaint filed by respondents with the CFI of Rizal for the annulment of judgment states that they reside
at Caloocan
City and that petitioners, as
defendants, reside at Cavite
(p. 48, Rollo).  Since
the action for annulment of judgment is a personal one, the venue of the action
in this case should be either CFI of Caloocan or CFI
of Cavite at the election of the plaintiff.  Clearly, venue was improperly laid in the CFI
of Rizal and respondent judge should have dismissed
the action for annulment of judgment on the ground of improper venue.

It is significant to state at this point that although the
prevailing rule before B.P. 129 was that courts of first instance and their
branches have jurisdiction to annul each other’s final judgments and orders as
ruled in Dulap and subsequent cases, fundamental
principles still dictate that the better policy, as a matter of comity or
courteous interaction between courts of first instance and the branches
thereof, is for the annulment cases to be tried by the same court or branch
which heard the main action sought to be annulled (Gianan
v. Imperial, supra).  Moreover,
despite the re-examination by this Court of the old ruling in Mas v. Dumara-og, supra,
recent decisions still uphold its rationale that pursuant to judicial
stability, the doctrine of non-interference should be regarded as highly
important in the administration of justice whereby the judgment of a court of competent jurisdiction may not be
opened, modified or vacated by any court of concurrent jurisdiction (Ngo Bun Tiong v. Sayo, No. L-45825, June 30, 1988, 163 SCRA 237;
Republic v. Reyes, Nos. L-30263-65, October 30, 1987; Parco v. Court of
Appeals, No. L-33152, January 30, 1982, 111 SCRA).

While the foregoing discussion may no longer find any application
at this time with the effectivity of Batas Pambansa, Blg. 129, enacted on
August 10, 1981, which transferred the jurisdiction over actions for annulment
of judgment to the Court of Appeals, it was deemed necessary if only to bring
light and settle the existing confusion and chaos among judges of the different
courts of first instance and their branches concerning the application of the
old laws on jurisdiction and venue over this kind of action.  Probably, this confusion was the underlying
reason of the Legislature behind the transfer of jurisdiction over annulment of
judgments from the trial courts to the Court of Appeals under B.P. 129.

Even if We were to disregard, for the sake of argument, the issue
on jurisdiction of and venue in the Court of First Instance of Rizal in the annulment suit, We found, upon perusal of the
records, that no sufficient grounds exist to justify the annulment of the final
judgment of the Cavite court.  Certain requisites must be established before
a judgment can be the subject of an action for annulment.  A judgment can be annulled only on two grounds:  (a) the judgment is void for want of
jurisdiction or for lack of due process of law, or (b) it has been obtained by
fraud (Santiago v. Ceniza, No. L-17322, June 30, 1962, 5 SCRA 494).

None of the aforementioned grounds was shown to exist to support
the annulment action.  The contention of
private respondents that they were not served with summons in Case No. TM-223
in the Cavite
court is untenable.  In their memorandum
filed with this Court, they admit that they were served with summons thru their
co-defendant Antonio Samonte who acknowledged receipt
thereof.  The receipt of summons is shown
by the return submitted by the sheriff to the Court of First Instance of Cavite.  Apart from
the presumption that the sheriff had regularly performed his functions, records
amply show that all the defendants, including private respondents had filed
their answer in Case No.TM-223 thru counsel, Atty. Danilo
Pine.  And when final judgment had been
rendered by the CFI of Cavite against respondents and
a writ of execution issued by the trial court, the private respondents, thru
the same counsel, Atty. Pine even instituted a petition for certiorari
and mandamus to enjoin the execution of the judgment of the Cavite court.  Respondents now allege that they have not
authorized Atty. Danilo Pine to appear in their
behalf as defendants in Case No. TM-223 or to file the
petition for certiorari with the appellate court.  Such allegation is devoid of merit.

An attorney is presumed to be properly authorized to represent
any cause in which he appears, and no written power of attorney is required to authorize
him to appear in court for his client (Sec. 21, Rule 138, Rules
of Court).  The fact that private
respondents had not personally appeared in the hearings of Case TM-223 in the
trial court is immaterial.  The filing of
the answer by and appearance of Atty. Danilo Pine in
their behalf are sufficient to give private respondents standing in court.  It is hard to believe that a counsel who has
no personal interest in the case would fight for and defend a case with
persistence and vigor if he had not been authorized or employed by the party
concerned.  It is obvious that since the
appellate court had decided adversely against private respondents in their
petition for certiorari, the latter filed the annulment suit for a
second chance at preventing petitioners from enforcing the decision rendered by
the Cavite court in favor of the latter.

It is an important fundamental principle in Our
judicial system that every litigation must come to an end.  Access to the courts is guaranteed.  But there must be a limit thereto.  Once a litigant’s rights have been
adjudicated in a valid final judgment of a competent court, he should not be
granted an unbridled license to come back for another try.  The prevailing party should not be harassed
by subsequent suits.  For, if endless
litigations were to be encouraged, unscrupulous litigants will multiply in
number to the detriment of the administration of justice (Ngo Bun Tiong v. Sayo, supra; Pacquing v. Court of Appeals, G.R. 52498, July 19, 1982,
115 SCRA 117).

ACCORDINGLY, the petition is GRANTED and the respondent
judge of the Court of First Instance of Rizal (now
Regional Trial Court) is ORDERED to dismiss Civil Case No. C-2442.  The temporary restraining order issued by
this Court is hereby made permanent.

SO ORDERED.

Narvasa, (Chairman), Cruz, Gancayco, and Griño-Aquino, JJ., concur.