JOSE GARRIDO, PLAINTIFF-APPELLEE, VS. CAYETANO ENRIQUEZ, AND SIMEONA JAVIER, DEFENDANTS-APPELLANTS.

This is an appeal from
the decision of the Court of First Instance of Manila “sentencing the
defendants, jointly and severally, to pay the plaintiff the sum of
P1,800.00 with interest at the legal
rate from February 20, 1959, until the obligation is fully paid plus the sum of
P100.00 as attorney’s fees, and
the cost of the suit.” Originally elevated to the Court of Appeals, this
case was certified to us since no ques­tion of fact is involved.

On September
20, 1947 defendant Simeona Javier received from the plaintiff two
pieces of jewelry under the terms and conditions
set forth in a receipt executed by the former, which reads as follows:

“He recibido de Don Jose Garrido un broche de oro con un brillante de medio kilate y un anillo de caballero
con un brillante solitario
del tamaño de un kilate, ambas alhajas de la propiedad de dicho Señor Jose Garrido, para ser vendidas dichas alhajas por el valor de mil ochocientos
pesos (P1,800.00).  Ententiendose
que dichas alhajas o la cantidad arriba estipulada de mil ochocientos (P1,800.00) seran entregadas a dicho Señor Jose Garrido en su residencia
55 Alejandro VI Sampaloc, Manila
en o antes del primero de Octubre de 1947.

The said defendant failed to return the two pieces of jewelry described in the above receipt or to pay
the agreed value thereof in the sum of P1,800.00 in spite of repeated demands made on
her.  As a consequence, she was charged with estafa
in an information filed on December 16, 1947 in the Court of First Instance
of Manila.  On March 19, 1948 while the criminal case was
pending in the trial court, she wrote to the plaintiff requesting him to allow
her pay the sum of P1,800.00 by installments at the
rate of P50.00 each, payable on the 5th and 20th days of each month beginning April 5, 1948.  Acceding to the request, the plaintiff endorsed
the letter to the City Fiscal and informed him that he was not interposing any
objection to the suspension of the hearing of the case in order to give the
defendant another chance.  Upon motion of
the City Fiscal, the case was pro­visionally dismissed with the written consent
of the defend­ant on March 22, 1948.

Evidently the said defendant failed to pay the installments due
as proposed by her in her letter of March
19, 1948.  At the instance of
the plaintiff, the Assistant City Fiscal moved to set aside the order of
provisional dismissal dated March 22,
1948, to revive the case, and to set the same for trial.  The trial court granted the motion on January 12, 1950.  However, notwithstanding the lapse of time
since the order of arrest was issued, the authorities failed to apprehend the
accused, thereby causing delay in the hearing of the case.  In order that said case might not appear
pending for an indefinite period, the trial court on July 6, 1950 “ordered that the above-entitled
case be sent to the files without prejudice on the part of the Fiscal to
prosecute the same as soon as the defendant is apprehended.”

When the whereabouts of defendant Simeona
Javier was discovered sometime during the first week of January 1959, the City Fiscal filed a petition for the issuance
of an alias warrant of arrest, which was granted by the trial court on January
14, 1959.  Having been arrested, the said defendant
posted a bail bond for her release.  On
February 18, 1959, prior to the hearing of the criminal case, the plaintiff
filed therein a reservation of the right to institute a separate civil action
against the defendant and on February 20, 1959 he filed the instant case for
the recovery of the value of the two pieces of jewelry in the sum of
P1,800.00.  Being the husband of
defendant Simeona Jaiver, Cayetano Enriquez was joined as party-defendant.  On March 9, 1959 the defendants filed their answer with
counterclaim, alleging, among other defenses, that the cause of action of the
plaintiff had already prescribed.

In the meantime, on June 9,
1959 the trial of
the criminal case proceeded.  In view of
the failure of the prosecution “to prove the guilt of the accused beyond
reasonable doubt,” Simeona Javier was acquitted
on October 2, 1959.

On the basis of the
transcript in the criminal case as well as other evidence submitted by the
parties, the lower court, on March 21, 1962, rendered the decision now subject of this
appeal.

The only issue raised by
the appellants is prescription.  They contend that since the cause of action
accrued on October 1, 1947, the date when appellant Simeona
Javier was supposed to return the two pieces of jewelry or pay the value
thereof under the terms of the receipt which she executed on September 20,
1947, the ten-year prescriptive period had already lapsed when the appellee filed his complaint in the lower court on February
20, 1959.

The contention is without
merit.  Section 1, Rule 111 of the
Revised Rules of Court^[1] provides as follows:

“Section 1.  Institution of Criminal And Civil Actions.  – When
a criminal action is instituted, the civil action for recovery of civil
liability arising from the offense charged is impliedly instituted with the
criminal action, unless the offended party expressly waives the civil
action or reserves his right to institute it separately.

Consequently, when the
criminal action was filed against Simeona Javier on December
16, 1947 the civil action for recovery of her
civil liability was deemed instituted with it. 
The appellee did not then reserve his right to
institute the civil action separately;
he did so on a much later date – February
18, 1959.  In the interim the civil aspect
of the case was kept alive by its pendency in the
criminal action, from the time it was revived on January 12, 1950, up to the time the reservation was made.

Actually,
therefore, the only, periods available for purposes of prescription were from
October 1, 1947, when the cause of action accrued, up to December 16 of the
same year, when the criminal action for estafa was
filed; then from March 22, 1948, when the said action was provisionally
dismissed, up to January 12, 1950, when it was revived by order of the Court;
and lastly, from February 18, 1959, when the appellee
expressly reserved his right to institute a separate civil action, to February
20, 1959, when the com­plaint in said action was filed.  The aggregate duration thereof is less than
the prescriptive period.

Wherefore, the judgment appealed from is hereby affirmed, with costs against the
appellants.

Concepcion, C.J., Reyes, J.B.L., Dizon, Zaldivar, Castro,
Fernando, Teehankee, and
Barredo, JJ., concur.

Sanchez, J., did not take part.

^[1]
Formerly Section 1(a), Rule 107.