QUINTIN DE BORJA, PLAINTIFF AND APPELLANT, VS. FELICIANA MARIANO, DEFENDANT AND APPELLEE,

This
is a case which this court should finally dispose of, by virtue of the
provisions of section 138 of the Revised Administrative Code, as
amended by section 3 of Commonwealth Act No. 259, because the plaintiff
appealed from the decision rendered therein by the court of origin when
the latter failed to grant him what he had sought in his complaint, and
because most of the evidence then presented in said court is the same
as that presented in another case pending therein under No. 6009,
which, after having been brought later on appeal to this court, was
recently decided adversely to the defendant-appellant therein, who is
no other than the herein plaintiff Quintin de Borja (G. R. No. 44040,
Oct. 28, 1938).

The question involved in the court of origin
referred to some actions instituted by the plaintiff against the
defendant for the recovery from the latter of the following sums:
P16,000 with the stipulated interest thereon at 12 per cent per annum
from September 2, 1926, until fully paid; P1,920 plus legal interest
thereon from August 27, 1927; P1,000 as penalty, and P2,300 with legal
interest thereon from September 2, 1928, until fully paid. In his
complaint, the plaintiff asked that, in case of failure to pay the
above-stated sums within ninety days from the date the judgment became
final, the property described in his Exhibit A be sold at public
auction to satisfy said sums with the proceeds of the sale thereof, and
that in case said proceeds should not be sufficient for said purpose,
the defendant be ordered to pay the resulting deficiency.

After the trial, the lower court rendered judgment against the
defendant, ordering her to pay to the plaintiff, within the period of
90 days from the date the judgment should become final, the following
sums: P10,000 plus interest thereon at 12 per cent per annum, and
P2,300 plus interest thereon at the same rate per annum, with the
warning that should she fail to do so, the mortgaged properties would
be sold at public auction undoubtedly for the purpose of applying the
proceeds of the sale thereof to the above-stated sums plus the interest
thereon. Not satisfied with the judgment, the plaintiff appealed
therefrom, alleging later in his brief that the-lower court committed
what he claims to be errors, stated as follows:

“1.
The lower court erred in declaring that the P6,000 included in the
deed, Exhibit A, for P16,000, represented an amount due against the
deceased Cornelio Sarangaya and not one against the defendant-appellee
herein;

“2. The lower court erred in declaring that the
amount of P6,000 included in the P16,000 claimed by plaintiff-appellant
against the defendant-appellee, had already been adjudged in civil case
No. 2585;

“3. The lower court erred in disregarding the
unequivocal and precise terms of the public documents Exhibit A and in
giving greater faith and credit to the uncorroborated, uncertain, and,
contradictory testimony of defendant-appellee;

“4. The
lower court erred in disregarding and in not awarding
plaintiff-appellant’s claim in the sum of P1,920 as principal and
P1,000 as indemnity, against the defendant-appellee, despite the
promissory note, Exhibit B, and the admissions of the appellee with
respect thereto; and

“5. The lower court erred in denying appellant’s motion for a new trial.”

1. A careful examination of the evidence shows that the sum of P16,000
   referred to in Exhibit A, which is not a contract of sale with pacto de retro
   although it is so-called in the body thereof, but a mere mortgage,
   because this is the nature given to it by the plaintiff himself in his
   lastly amended complaint, consisted, first of the sum of P5,000 with
   interest thereon, which Comelio Sarangaya, in life, owed to Marcelo de
   Borja, of whose intestate estate the plaintiff was the administrator
   while said proceedings were yet pending and under trial in the Court of
   First Instance of Rizal, for which sum said Cornelio Sarangaya had
   executed the promissory note, Exhibit B, on September 22, 1919, which
   his widow, the defendant Feliciana Mariano acknowledged on July 30,
   1922, by then binding herself to pay the amount thereof in the month of
   June 1924 (Exhibit B), and of the sum of P40,000 which the plaintiff
   had paid for said defendant to Dr. Nicanor Jacinto to whom she was
   indebted in the same amount, excluding interest thereon. The plaintiff
   attempted to prove that the sum of P6,000 of the above-stated amount of
   P16,000, represents an account entirely distinct from that expressed in
   Exhibit B, and that the same is a personal account of the defendant
   with which her deceased husband had nothing to do. This could not be
   true, because when the plaintiff rendered his accounts, as
   administrator, in the intestate proceedings of his father Marcelo de
   Borja, for the period intervening between January 1, 1925, and the last
   day of December, 1926, he made it appear that the credit of P6,000,
   which the intestate estate had against the defendant, had been
   cancelled on the ground that she had executed the deed of sale with pacto de retro,
   Exhibit A, which, as already stated, is but a mere mortgage. The
   plaintiff having admitted that the 76,000 included in the Pl6,000
   stated in Exhibit A and the P5,000 without interest mentioned in
   Exhibit B, were loans made by the deceased Marcelo de Borja and by his
   intestate estate to Cornelio Sarangaya, during his lifetime, and to the
   latter’s widow, that is the herein defendant-appellee (appellant’s
   brief, page 7), it becomes inexplicable that said two sums, if it is
   true that they were distinct and not one and the same, have not been
   included in said Exhibit A, all the more so because it is not stated
   therein that the defendant bound herself to comply with the
   stipulations thereof in her capacity as administratrix or heiress of
   her deceased husband, but on the contrary, that she personally bound
   herself to said performance.

   It is true that Exhibit B
   has remained in the possession of the plaintiff and that apparently it
   continues to be uncancelled to this date, but this certainly proves
   nothing and can easily be explained. The defendant, naturally, might
   have thought that, as she had already executed Exhibit A, said Exhibit
   B became worthless, and for that reason she no longer attempted to ask
   for the return thereof. On the other hand, she testified that it was
   her understanding with the plaintiff that the latter would destroy the
   document in question.

   The very fact that the defendant agreed to subscribe Exhibit A, after
   the plaintiff had paid to Dr. Nicanor Jacinto, for her, the sum of
   P10,000 owed by her to the latter, which fact is admitted by both
   parties, and the fact that on that same occasion she agreed to
   subscribe the deed Exhibit C, which will be discussed later, prove that
   there were no such two accounts of P6,000 each, but only one; that
   stated in Exhibit B with interest thereon, which was the same account
   included in Exhibit A, so that the entire obligation to be charged
   against her, with her absolute conformity, would be P16,000, instead of
   P10,000.

   To arrive at the same conclusion that the sum of P5,000 referred to in
   Exhibit B is, together with interest thereon, the same sum of P6,000
   under consideration, there is this other reason. According to the
   uncontradicted testimony of the defendant, she had failed to pay the
   interest on said amount corresponding to the year 1925. This
   necessarily shows that at the end of said year, her obligation for
   interest alone amounted to P600, since the rate stipulated was 12 per
   cent per annum. To said interest, there should be added that which,
   according to her, she likewise failed to pay by way of interest
   corresponding to the months of January to August, 1926, inclusive,
   amounting to P400, at the same rate of 12 per cent per annum, from
   which it may be inferred that what she had to pay by way of interest
   was P1,000. With this, it clearly appears that the sum of P6,000 added
   to that of P10,000 referred to in Exhibit A to make the amount of
   P16,000, is made up of the P5,000 stated in Exhibit B and the P1,000
   which the defendant had to pay by way of unpaid interest. We should not
   lose sight of the fact that said document or contract Exhibit A was
   executed on September 2, 1926, for which reason the interest on the
   P5,000, corresponding to said month of September and the following
   months, was not included therein.

2. The evidence relative to the account of P6,000 under consideration
   herein shows that the same had already been the subject matter of a
   litigation between the herein parties litigant in case No. 2585 of the
   Court of First Instance of Nueva Ecija, entitled “Intestate Estate of
   the deceased Cornelio Sarangaya.” In said case, the plaintiff presented
   his claim for P5,000 plus interest thereon at 12 per cent per annum
   before the committee on claims and appraisal appointed therein by the
   court. His claim was approved by said committee and later by the court.
   As soon as the resolution approving it became final, the plaintiff
   applied for and obtained from the court, on March 3, 1926, an order
   directing the defendant, as administratrix of the intestate estate of
   Cornelio Sarangaya, to pay to said plaintiff the sum in question
   together with interest thereon. Five months later, that is, on
   September 2, 1926, the defendant executed the above-stated deed Exhibit
   A in favor of the plaintiff.

   It appears from the
   testimony of the defendant that Exhibit A includes Cornelio Sarangaya’s
   obligation stated in Exhibit B, which was approved by the committee on
   claims and appraisal in said case No. 2585 of the Court of First
   Instance of Nueva Ecija and by said court in its order of March 3,
   1926. It will be noted from Exhibit A that the period within which the
   defendant promised to pay to the plaintiff the sum of P16,000 stated
   therein, is three (3) years counted from September 2, 1926. In other
   words, she promised to make said payment on or before September 2,
   1929. The defendant having failed to pay said amount, the plaintiff
   applied to the lower court, in civil case No. 2585 (Intestate estate of
   the deceased Cornelio Sarangaya), for the purpose of obtaining, as he
   in fact obtained on March 26, 1930, the issuance of a writ for the
   execution of the resolution obtained by him in his favor in said case,
   granting him his claim of P5,000 plus interest thereon at 12 per cent
   per annum. The execution was carried out by the sheriff and, there
   having been no bidder at the auction except the plaintiff, the sheriff
   adjudicated to the latter the defendant’s properties which had been
   attached by him for sale at said auction. The plaintiff, however, did
   not succeed in keeping the properties so purchased by him, because
   shortly afterwards Juana Sarangaya and Felix Daluz brought suit against
   him, giving rise to case No. 6009 of the Court of First Instance of
   Nueva Ecija, for the purpose of annulling the sale of said properties
   to him, alleging therein that said properties had previously been sold
   to them by the herein defendant. The lower court decided the suit in
   favor of Juana Sarangaya and Felix Daluz, and this court, on appeal
   taken by the defendant therein, affirmed said judgment in its decision
   now of record in case G. R. No. 44040 (Oct. 28, 1938).

   Taking into account the foregoing facts, there necessarily arise the
   following questions: (1) Was the resolution rendered in favor of the
   plaintiff in civil case No. 2585 of the Court of First Instance of
   Nueva Ecija, imposing upon the defendant the obligation to pay him the
   sum of P5,000 with interest thereon at 12 per cent per annum, novated
   by the contract Exhibit A? (2) If so, what effect on the contract
   Exhibit A could have been produced by the plaintiff’s act of filing a
   petition in case No. 2585 of the Court of First Instance of Nueva
   Ecija, for the execution of the resolution rendered in his favor more
   than three years before, merely because the defendant failed to comply
   with the terms of the contract in question?

   There is no doubt that the resolution of the Court of First Instance in
   the intestate estate of the deceased Cornelio Sarangaya, approving the
   claim of the plaintiff presented therein before the committee on claims
   and appraisal, created and imposed upon the defendant the obligation to
   pay to the plaintiff the sum of P5,000 plus interest thereon which, as
   already stated, then amounted to P1,000. Said obligation, as any other,
   could be extinguished and novated. This was done when the defendant and
   the plaintiff executed the deed Exhibit A, because the obligation
   imposed upon the former by said deed is incompatible with that imposed
   by the resolution in question, inasmuch as both obligations, being one
   and the same, should not and can not each have its own independent
   existence. Exhibit A undoubtedly novated the obligation imposed upon
   the defendant by the resolution in question, and for all purposes, the
   latter not only has lost all its force and effect but has also been
   extinguished by the execution of Exhibit A (article 1204 of the Civil
   Code). Consequently, said contract is the only instrument with force to
   compel the defendant.

   The fact that the plaintiff resorted to the above-cited case (Intestate
   estate of the deceased Cornelio Sarangaya), for the recovery of his
   credit of F5,000 plus interest thereon by means of the execution of the
   resolution therein rendered in his favor, has not in the least altered
   the effect of Exhibit A, because when he did so, he did not even have
   the acquiescence, much less the consent, of the defendant. No person
   can, by himself alone, alter the terms of a contract entered into by
   him with another.

   The conclusion to which this court is led by the foregoing
   considerations with respect to errors 1 to 3 attributed to the lower
   court, is that none of them is founded, because, as the obligation of
   the defendant to pay the sum of P6,000 to the plaintiff, which was
   imposed upon her by the resolution of the committee on claims and
   appraisal in civil case No. 2585 and approved by the lower court, has
   been novated by means of the execution of Exhibit A; and as the
   defendant has failed to pay said sum to the plaintiff as she bound
   herself to do in said document, she should do so now, not by virtue of
   the resolution in question but by virtue of Exhibit A. In other words,
   the defendant should pay to the plaintiff the sum of P16,000 plus
   interest thereon at 12 per cent per annum from September 2, 1926, until
   fully paid.

3. As to the fourth error attributed to the lower court by the plaintiff,
   the preponderance of the evidence shows that the defendant was indebted
   to the plaintiff, independently of the sum of P16,000 stated
   hereinbefore, in the sum of P2,300 together with interest thereon, and
   that the same was her personal obligation not in any way related: to
   the intestate estate of her deceased husband, Cornelio Sarangaya. This
   explains why she executed Exhibit C, which, as already stated, bears
   the same date as Exhibit A (September 2, 1926). If, as the defendant
   attempted to prove, said sum of P2,300 plus interest thereon had any
   relation to the sum stated in Exhibit A, there would be no possible
   explanation of her execution of said document Exhibit C, much less if
   it is borne in mind that she executed the same on the same date she
   executed Exhibit A. If she executed it, it was undoubtedly because she
   well knew that two accounts under different concepts and of distinct
   nature were involved.

Having arrived at the
above-stated conclusion, it becomes unnecessary to discuss the fifth
alleged error attributed to the lower court.

For all the foregoing, the appealed judgment is modified by ordering the defendant to pay to the plaintiff: (a)
the sum of P16,000 plus the interest thereon at 12 per cent per annum
from September 2, 1926, until fully paid, it being held, in passing,
that the obligation imposed upon the defendant by the resolution of the
committee on claims and appraisal appointed in civil case No. 2585 of
the Court of First Instance of Nueva Ecija, entitled “Intestate estate
of the deceased Cornelio Sarangaya” and approved by said court on March
3, 1926, has been extinguished, having been novated by means of the
execution of the contract Exhibit A; and (b) also the sum of
P2,300 plus the interest thereon at the same rate of 12 per cent per
annum from September 2, 1926, until fully paid. In all other respects,
the appealed judgment is affirmed, with the costs to the defendant. So
ordered.

Avanceña, C. J., Villa-Real, Abad Santos, Imperial, Laurel, and Concepcion, JJ., concur.