THE DIRECTOR OF LANDS, PETITIONER, VS. JOSE INSA, CLAIMANT AND APPELLANT, AND ARSENIA ENRIQUEZ, CLAIMANT AND APPELLEE.

OSTRAND, J.:

The question involved in the present case is one of two partly overlapping
Torrens titles and is before this court upon appeal from a decision of the Court
of First Instance in a cadastral registration case adjudging the land to the
appellee Arsenia Enriquez.

The title of the appellant Jose Insa is deraigned from one Severino Lerma
who, by a decree of the Court of Land Registration dated January 3, 1905,
obtained an original Director of Lands vs. Insa and Enriquez certificate of
title to the land in dispute. The appellee Arsenia Enriquez claims title under a
transfer certificate of title from Prisca de los Reyes and sisters, who held the
original certificate of title under a decree dated December 19, 1905. (See
sketches figures Nos. 1 and 2.)

(IMAGE)

The situation of the land in question may be best understood by a reference
to the sketch, fig. 1. The portion lying within the points 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7,
8, 9 and 10 of the sketch is high land and the undisputed property of the
appellant Insa. The triangular portion lying within the points 1, 10, 9, 8, 7
and 11 is in dispute and is low grass land. The adjoining land to the west of
the line 1-11 and to the south of the line 7-11 is the undisputed property of
the appellee Enriquez and is low land of the same general character as the
disputed portion. Points Nos. 1, 2, 5 and 7 are marked with very old monuments
of adobe stone and points Nos. 9 and 10 are marked with old Bureau of Lands
monuments probably placed there at the time of the land registration surveys in
the year 1904. Most of the other points are marked with new Bureau of Lands
monuments. There is no monument of any kind at point No. 11. The line 1-10-9-8-7
is also indicated in the field by a continuous row of heavy bamboo along the
entire length of the line.

As already stated, the disputed portion is covered by the certificates of
title of both parties. As the decree upon which the appellant’s title is founded
is older than that of the appellee, the former would, under ordinary
circumstances, prevail (Legarda and Prieto vs. Saleeby, 31 Phil., 590) and if
the plans from which the land description in the appellant’s certificate of
title were taken correctly reflected the surveys made for the purpose of the
registration we should unhesitatingly reverse the judgment appealed from,
irrespective of the consequences to the parties.

But here it is conclusively shown not only by undisputed testimony but also
by the plans themselves that the western line shown on the Lerma plan is not the
line surveyed and monumented, but simply an imaginary line which has crept into
the plan through a mistake of the draftsman in interpreting the field notes of
the surveyor.

This clearly appears from sketch fig. 2, a copy of the Lerma plan from which
the land described in the appellant’s certificate of title is taken. The
diminutive squares at corners 1, 2, 3 and 5 represent adobe monuments
corresponding to the monuments at points 1, 7, 5 and 2 of sketch fig. 1. In
making the survey the surveyor evidently used an Azimuth Compass and began his
survey at point 1. In sighting from that point to the monument on the SW. corner
of the land, the reading of the compass would be approximately SE. 163° 30′
instead of SW. 203° 30′ as appearing on the plan. The method employed by the
surveyor in indicating the courses of the lines was practically unknown in this
country at that time and errors in drafting might therefore readily occur.

The error was not discovered until the cadastral survey was made some sixteen
years later. In the meantime the appellee occupied the land now in dispute and
neither the appellant nor his predecessors in interest laid any claim to it;
evidently the thought did not occur to them that the land was included in their
certificate of title.

It is also to be observed that in the first few years after the enactment of
the Land Registration Act the plans submitted to the Court of Land Registration
were usually grossly inaccurate. In the present case the plan we have discussed
has an error of closure of 1:119, which shows the existence of such large
discrepancies in the courses of the various lines of the plan that it, in any
event, would be impossible to determine the exact limits of the land from the
plan itself. That the plan on which the description of the land in the
certificate of title of the appellee is taken is even more inaccurate does not,
of course, improve matters.

The court has therefore somewhat reluctantly arrived at the conclusion that
the judgment appealed from must be affirmed. The evidence that the Lerma plan
does not show the true lines of the survey upon which it is based and that the
error in question lies in the drafting of the plan is conclusive. This is
established by the undisputed testimony of persons who were present at the time
the survey was made and by the fact that the surveyor very evidently took the
adobe monument at point 7 of fig. 1 as the southwestern corner of the land; it
is f urthr shown by the bamboo hedges surrounding the land and by the monuments
existing thereon previously to the survey; and, finally, it is also indicated by
the continuous and open occupation of the now disputed portion by the appellee
and her predecessors for over sixteen years subsequent to the entry of the
decree of registration, without any adverse claim on the part of the
appellant.

The survey as actually made must prevail over an erroneous plan where the
variance between the two is conclusively established by the evidence and the
true boundary lines followed by the surveyor can be definitely ascertained.

The judgment appealed from is affirmed, without costs. So ordered.

Johnson, Street, Malcolm, Avanceña, Villamor, Johns, and
Romualdez, JJ,, concur.