JUAN DULDULAO AN MODESTO DULDULAO, PETITIONER, VS. HON. EUSEBIO F. RAMOS, JUDGE OF THE COURT OF FIRST INSTANCE OF ORIENTAL MINDORO; AND TOMAS SALVADOR, RESPONDENTS.

Juan Duldulao was issued a homestead patent on December 26, 1936,
which was afterward registered in the office of the Register of Deeds
of the province of Mindoro. Having an area of 23 hectares, according to
the official plat of the survey, this property, it is alleged, was
conveyed by Juan Duldulao to Modesto Duldulao on March 13, 1950. But
Tomas Salvador claimed to have purchased from Juan Duldulao on March 1,
1950, 16 hectares of the same parcel; and armed with the alleged deed
of sale, and alleging that the owner’s duplicate certificate of title
had been destroyed on April 7, 1947, when Juan Duldulao’s house in San
Jose was razed by fire, he filed a motion with the Court of First
Instance asking that “another Owner’s Duplicate Certificate of Title
No. 2497 in the name of Juan Duldulao, in substitution of that which
was destroyed be ordered issued by the Register of Deeds.” That motion
was granted.

Thereafter Juan Duldulao and Modesto Duldulao brought an original
action for certiorari in this Court (G. R. No. L-46l5) attacking the
judge’s (Judge Eusebio F. Ramos) jurisdiction to act on Salvador’s
motion, and complaining that the registered owner was not notified of
that motion.

The above petition for certiorari is still pending hearing, but
soon after it was docketed Juan Duldulao and Modesto Duldulao secured
from this Court a writ of preliminary injunction couched in the words
following:

“In G. R. No. L-46l5, Juan Duldulao, et al. vs.
Hon. Eusebio F. Ramos, etc. et al., the Court resolved to grant the
ex-parte urgent motion of attorney for petitioners, praying for the
issuance of a writ of preliminary injunction enjoining respondent Tomas
Salvador from dealing with the property in question in any manner or
interfering with the tenants therein, and requiring him to surrender to
this Court the owner’s duplicate certificate of title now in his
possession for further disposition by this Court, and ordered that,
upon the filing by the petitioners of a bond for P500, the writ of
preliminary injunction prayed for be issued.”

This injunction was issued on April 23, 1951, and the parties and
their attorneys were duly notified thereof. Subsequently the
petitioners filed a motion for contempt charging that Tomas Salvador
“has disobeyed and still is disobeying the aforequoted injunction in
that he has dislodged the tenants of the petitioners; that he insists
in appropriating the property; that he has prevented and still prevents
the duly appointed representative of the petitioners, Eusebio
Candalora, from entering and administering the property as well as
petitioner Juan Duldulao, said respondent threatening with bodily harm
anyone who would interfere in the premises.” This is the complaint that
initiated the present proceeding.

Required to answer, Tomas Salvador, through counsel, filed a
writing in which “he denies specifically the (complainants’)
allegations,” and attached to his answer sworn statements of himself,
of Eliseo A. Zubiri, Chief of Police of San Jose, Occidental Mindoro,
Silverio Eugenio, and Jose Sarmiento, all denying that the complainants
had been disturbed in their possession. On this answer being filed, the
clerk of this Court was appointed commissioner to receive the evidence
of the parties, and hearing was held on October 10, after it was
postponed on motion of Salvador’s counsel from October 8. At the
hearing only Juan Duldulao testified; Tomas Salvador’s attorney
appeared but Salvador himself did not, and no witness was called or any
evidence adduced in his behalf.

The bone of contention centers on the sufficiency of Joan Duldulao’s testimony to sustain the accusation.

Juan Duldulao in substance testified. He vas residing in
Camlling,Tarlac, and made a trip to San Jose on July 7, 19519 arriving
in that town the next day, Sunday. In San Jose, he called at the house
of the chief of police accompanied by one Felipe Arevalo. Not finding
the chief of police at his home, he vent to see the mayor, Isabelo
Abeleda, at his residence and manifested his desire to talk with Tomas
Salvador. The mayor promised to send for Tomas Salvador on Monday so
that Duldulao and Salvador could get together, and the next day
Salvador did come. In the presence of the Mayor he (witness) told
Salvador that he wanted to get back his land but Salvador said “no”.
Forthwith Duldulao took from his pocket his copy of the order of
injunction, the mayor asked Salvador wWill you give?” and Salvador
again answered “no”. Thereupon the mayor instructed his secretary to
draw a “reply” which the secretary did. (The so-called reply was
introduced in evidence as Exhibit “B”. It was a sworn statement signed
by Felipe Arevalo and Rodrlgo Guarin, Juan Duldulao’s companions, with
the mayor certifying that it had been subscribed and sworn to by the
affiants. It recites that “Tomas Salvador * * * alleged that he Intends
to file a counter bond with the end in view of continuing his
cultivation on the land in question or the land involved in this case.”
)

Duldulao further declared before the commissioner that Euseblo
Candalora was his “encargado”; that in San Jose he stayed in
Caldalora’s house; that Caldalora told him he had been driven out of
the land. He admitted that he did not go to the land itself, but said
it was because he was warned that if he went “they will be angry.” He
also declared that he had sis: tenants on the land who had been driven
away.

Juan Duldulao’s testimony was not as comprehensive and explicit as
it might have been. Its inadequacies are due in no small measure to the
defendants’ attorney’s persistent objections to questions the answers
to which might have been enlightening. Yet there is ample direct and
competent evidence to show that Salvador did defy the writ of
injunction. His curt “no” retort to Duldulao’s remark that Duldulao
wanted to have the land, and his similar reply to the mayor’s query
whether he would surrender the property to Duldulao, are certain and
eloquent corroboration of the motion for contempt.

Exhibit “B” is of special significance. Official in character and
written spontaneously at the Instance of the mayor who had no axe to
grind, the import of its content—that Salvador was ready and willing to
put up a counter-bond to continue his cultivation of the land—is so
apparent on its face as to be beyond conjecture, it could mean no other
than that Salvador was in physical possession of the farm and would not
part with it. The circumstances under which this exhibit was prepared
preclude the idea of deliberation or fabrication.

Although the witness did not see his “encargado” and tenants
ejected from the land, he spoke through his own knowledge when he said
that those people were out and were no longer tending the property when
he arrived in San Jose from Tarlac. This fact is at least a
confirmation of what they had told their employer, that they were being
kept out of the land in question. No one but Salvador or his
accomplices had any interest in excluding Duldulao’s tenants from it.

The unexplained failure of the defendant to refute by himself or
through other witnesses his accuser’s assertions is presumptive proof
of the truth of the charge. The affidavits which accompanied his answer
to the motion for contempt are not competent evidence. He relies on the
supposed weakness of his adversaries’ evidence, no little of which was
due to his attorney’s resort to technicalities, rather than on the
force of his denial which he could easily have substantiated if the
same had any truth behind it.

We are satisfied that Tomas Salvador is guilty of contempt as
charged, and he is hereby sentenced to pay a fine of P200 or be
imprisoned at the rate of one day for every P2.50 he fails to pay.

Paras, C.J., Feria, Pablo, Bengzon, Padilla, Reyes, Jugo and Bautista Angelo., concur.