MELECIO R. DOMINGO, ETC., PETITIONER, VS. HON. JUDGE S. C. MOSCOSO, ETC., ET AL., RESPONDENTS.

The Commissioner of Internal Revenue asks for certiorari to annul
the orders of the respondents judge of the Leyte court of first
instance setting aside a previous order of the same court dated
December 17, 1956, in Special Proceedings No. 14 entitled “In the
Matter of the Intestate Estate of the late Walter Scott Price.”

The petition rests on the allegation that such orders had been
entered without or in excess of jurisdiction, inasmuch as the order of
December 17, 1956, had already become final and executory.

It appears that after the Collector of Internal Revenue had
submitted in the said intestate proceedings a “proof of claim” for
estate and inheritance taxes in the sum of P40,058.55, the court on
December 17, 1956, ordered the administratrix to pay such amount. Copy
of the order was sent by registered mail on December 18, 1956, to the
attorney of the administratrix. It was received on December 26, 1956.
(Annex 2)

On June 14, 1957, the Collector of Internal Revenue asked for
execution of the order of payment, inasmuch as no appeal had been taken
therefrom. This gave ground to an opposition and a motion for
reconsideration by the administratrix, which was granted by the
respondent judge, who ruled in his questioned order of June 22, 1957,
that,

“* * * It appears that the proof of claim submitted
by the Collector of Internal Revenue Silverio Blaquera was filed in
this Court on December 7, 1956, without a copy having been furnished to
the administratrix or to her attorney. In equity the Court sets aside
its order dated December 17, 1956, and orders the claimant to furnish a
copy of the said claim to the administratrix or to her attorney before
the Court will again act on said claim.”

Two motions for revocation of this order were overruled in subsequent orders.

Hence this petition.

Considering the circumstances above related, we think the respondent
judge exceeded his jurisdiction in issuing the questioned order of June
22, because the decree of payment of December 17 had already become
final and executory. Counsel for the administratrix, it will be
recalled, received copy of such payment order on December 26, 1956. For six months
thereafter he made no move either to reconsider or to appeal. (He could
not even request relief under Rule 38, because more than sixty days had
passed.)

The failure to serve copy of the Collector’s claim to the
administratrix might, at most, be a legal error corrigible on appeal.
But it had no effect of depriving the court of jurisdiction as we held
in a parallel situation in Pineda vs. Court of First
Instance, 52 Phil., 803. This last case even went so far as to hold
that claims for taxes due and assessed after the death of the decedent
need not be presented in the regular form of claims in the testate or
intestate proceeding. Which holding means, as applied to the instant
lawsuit, that it was unnecessary to furnish copy to the administratrix; so the order revoking payment stands on no juridical ground.

Wherefore, the set-aside orders, particularly the order of June 22,
1957, are hereby annulled. As a consequence, the order dated December
17, 1956, is declared final and executory. Costs against respondent
Simeona K. Price.

So ordered.

Paras, C. J., Padilla, Bautista Angelo, Labrador, Concepcion, Barrera, and Gutierrez David, JJ., concur.
Montemayor, Reyes, J.B.L., and Endencia, JJ., took no part.