ASSOCIATED LABOR UNION AND AMORITO V. CAÑETE, PETITIONERS, VS. JUDGE FERNANDO A. CRUZ, GOODYEAR TEXTILE MFG. CO., AND NG TAY, RESPONDENTS.

This is a petition for certiorari
and prohibition directed against the correctness and validity of a restraining
order issued by the Court of First Instance of Rizal
to enjoin the “patrolling” by the members of the petitioning Union
of the premises and the street leading to the factory of the respondent
Goodyear Textile Manufacturing Company.

The facts pertinent to this case are as follows:

On 28 October 1967,
the Goodyear Textile Manufacturing Company and its manager, Ng Tay, filed a complaint in the Court of First Instance of Rizal (Case No. C-1153) against the Associated Labor Union
and its Regional Director, Amorito Cañete, alleging, among others:

“4.  That petitioners have a valid and subsisting
Collective Bargaining Agreement with the Goodyear Textile United Workers
Organization which has no strike and no lockout provisions for a period of two
(2) years from January 2, 1967;

“5.  That on October 25, 1967, some of the workers
of the petitioners Goodyear Textile Mfg. Co., who are allegedly members of the Associated
Labor Union, together with non-employees of petitioners who are members of the
Associated Labor Union, made and manned patrols around the premises of herein
petitioners, intimidating, threatening, coercing and committing acts of
violence upon the executives and workers of herein petitioner, Goodyear Textile
Mfg. Co., preventing them from going in and out of the factory and office of
herein petitioner;

“6.  That there are workers of herein petitioners
who are members of the Goodyear Textile Workers Organization (GUWO), with whom
petitioners have a Collective Bargaining Agreement who are presently working
inside the factory but could not go out for fear of bodily harm from persons
who are members of herein respondent, although not being employees of herein
petitioner;

“7.  That there are workers of herein petitioners
who would want to work but could not enter the factory of herein petitioners
because of the patrols manned by respondents and the threats, intimidation,
coercion being perpetrated by said patrols;

“8.  That the members of respondents have assaulted
and actually used force upon the executives and workers of petitioners
preventing them from entering the office and factory, consequently impairing
the exercise of their right of free movement and the pursuit of their lawful
calling or occupation;

xxxxx               xxxxx               xxxxx               xxxxx

Alleging further that the police can not
provide adequate protection to their executives, workers, customers, household
members and guests from the threats, coercion and intimidation perpetrated by
respondents’ men, and that the unlawful acts of said men were causing
petitioners actual damages in the amount of P2,000.00 a day starting from 25
October 1967, it was prayed the court that preliminary injunction be issued to restrain
respondents followers from patrolling or maintaining guards in the premises and
the street leading to the factory of the petitioners, and that respondents be
ordered to pay the sum of P500.00 for actual damages; P30,000.00, moral
damages; P5,000.00, nominal damages; and P10,000.00, exemplary damages.

In its order of 31 October 1967, the court set the hearing of the
complaint for 10 November 1967, and to maintain the status quo between
the parties it enjoined the respondents (herein petitioners) from placing
patrols within the premises and the street leading to the factory, upon
petitioners’ bond for P10,000.00.

On 7 November 1967,
therein respondents moved for the dismissal of the complaint and the lifting of
the restraining order of 31 October
1967, for lack of jurisdiction and failure of the complaint to
state a cause of action.  The Union
alleged that on 20 October 1967, charges for unfair labor practice were filed
against the company in the Court of Industrial Relations (Charge No. 2163-ULP),
which case was yet unresolved; that on 10 October 1967, respondent Union filed
with the Department of Labor a Notice of Strike, assigning as reason therefor union-busting, coercion, threats, etc., employed
by the company against the employee members of the Union; that a strike against
the company was actually called on 25 October 1967, in connection with which
strike picket lines were maintained in the immediate vicinity of the
strike-bound factory.  It does not appear
that a formal complaint based on the foregoing charges was ever filed; instead,
on 23 December 1967, an
action for unfair labor practice was instituted by the Court prosecutors in the
same Court of Industrial Relations against the Associated Labor Union and 60 of
its officers and members, upon charges —

“xxxxx              xxxxx               xxxxx

“5.  That on October 25, 1967, without proper
notice and for trivial purposes, respondents staged an illegal strike against
complainant and then and there, willfully and unlawfully picketed the premises
of complainant; prevented the free ingress and egress of complainant’s company
officials and their families, customers and other employees who wanted to
report for work, by threatening them of inflicting bodily harm; and hurling
against them slanderous utterances; blocking the gate of complainant by forming
human blockade and lying down on the ground; by placing hollow blocks and tires
in front of the gate to prevent free ingress and egress of customers’ vehicles
and by committing damage to property by smashing complainant’s vehicles with
placards and hard objects, and by assaulting its employees inside the
complainant’s vehicles;

xxxxx               xxxxx               xxxxx

“8.  That respondents’ acts in staging an illegal
strike under the foregoing circumstances constitute bargaining in bad faith in
violation of Section 4 (b), sub-sections 1 and 3 in relation to Sections 12,
13, 14 and 15 of Republic Act 875.

xxxxx               xxxxx               xxxxx.”

On 5 February 1968,
the court ordered the dismissal of the complaint and the lifting of the
restraining order of 31 October 1967,
in Civil Case No. C-1153, on the finding that a labor dispute existed between
the parties.  Upon motion, however, the
court, by order of 2 March 1968,
set aside the aforementioned order of 5
February 1967 and had the order of 31 October 1967 (restraining the respondent Union
from putting up patrols in the company premises and the street leading to the
factory) reinstated until further orders. 
The Union thereupon instituted this certiorari proceedings.

The order dismissing the injunction case in the court below
should have been maintained.  It is true
that there is no indication from the complaint in Civil Case No. C-1153 that
there exists an industrial dispute between the parties; in fact, there is
discernible effort on the part of therein petitioners (herein respondent
company) to avoid mention of the nature or cause of the alleged unlawful acts
perpetrated by therein respondents (petitioners here).  Nevertheless, it can not be contended that
the court was not apprised of the situation actually obtaining in the
case.  In its answer to the complaint,
the Union specifically pleaded the pendency
of an unfair labor practice charge against the petitioning company in the Court
of Industrial Relations and the declaration of a strike on 25 October 1967 against said company.  And whatever doubt there may have been
regarding the character of the threats, coercion or violence allegedly
committed by herein petitioners was totally dispelled by the formal complaint
presumably based on the company’s charges, filed by the Court Prosecutors in
the Industrial Court (Case No. 4924-ULP), charging the Union and its members
with having staged an illegal strike on 25 October 1967; unlawfully picketing
the company premises and preventing the free movement into and out of the
premises of company officials and other employees who wanted to report for
work.  This unfair labor practice case
against the Union had been filed on 28 December 1967, months before the disputed
order of 2 March 1968 was
issued.

There is no pretension here whatsoever that the threats,
coercion, violence, etc. said to have been committed by therein respondents on 25 October 1967, and upon which the
claim for damages in Civil Case No. C-1153 was based, were different from the
threats, coercion, violence, etc. which were the subject of the unfair labor
practice case in the Court of Industrial Relations (Case No. 4924-ULP).  In fact, herein petitioners, as respondents
in the civil case, stoutly maintained the lack of jurisdiction of the court
below on account of the existence of a labor dispute between the parties.  Indeed it is clear, following the settled
jurisprudence on the matter, that since the issue of the Union’s liability for
damages will depend on the legality or illegality of the acts allegedly committed
by the members of the petitioner Union, a question that is directly connected
or intertwined with the unfair labor practice case pending before the
Industrial Court, the issue properly falls within the jurisdiction of said
court.^[1]
The court below, therefore, upon being informed of the labor dispute, should
have dismissed the case for damages pending before it, or at least suspended
action thereon, until final determination of the labor controversy in the Court
of Industrial Relations.^[2]

The fact that when the complaint for damages was filed in the
court of first instance no formal charge for unfair labor practice against any
of the parties has as yet been presented in the Court of Industrial Relations,
or that the Union’s charges against the company were subsequently withdrawn,
would not affect at all the jurisdiction of the Industrial Court to take
cognizance of the labor dispute.  It may
be pointed out that at the time the order subject of this proceeding was issued
on 2 March 1968, the unfair
labor practice case against the Union (Case No.
4924-ULP) for having declared an illegal strike was already pending in the
Court of Industrial Relations.  There can
be no question, therefore, that the matter of culpability of the members of the
Union for acts or measures taken allegedly in
perpetration of such strike is beyond the competence of the court of first
instance to pass upon.

FOR THE FOREGOING CONSIDERATIONS, the respondent Court’s
order of 2 March 1968 is
hereby reversed, and Civil Case No. C-1153 is ordered dismissed, without
prejudice to the right of the company to file the appropriate action, if the
circumstances warrant it, after the termination of the unfair labor practice
case (No. 4924-ULP) in the Court of Industrial Relations.  No costs.

Concepcion, C.J., Dizon,
Makalintal, Zaldivar,
Castro, Teehankee, Barredo,
Villamor, and Makasiar, JJ., concur.

Fernando, J., in the result.

^[1] Leoquinco vs. Canada Dry Bottling Co. of the Phil.
Employees Association, L-28621, 22
February 1971, and cases cited therein.

^[2]
Regal Manufacturing Employees Association vs. Reyes, L-24388, 29 July
1968, 24 SCRA 352; Leoquinco vs. Canada Dry
Bottling Co., etc., supra; Rustan
Supervisory Union vs. Hon. Moises Dalisay, L-32891, 29 April 1971, 38 SCRA 500.