JORGE NAVARRA AND CARMELITA BERNARDO NAVARRA AND THE RRRC DEVELOPMENT CORP., PETITIONERS, VS. COURT OF APPEALS AND PLANTERS DEVELOPMENT BANK, RESPONDENTS.

The respondent Court of Appeals^[1]
is faulted in this petition for review for sustaining the orders of the trial court dated February 22, 1988, and
May 20, 1988.

The petitioners, spouses Jorge Navarra and Carmelita Bernardo,
together with Ruben Bernardo and Cresencia
Villanueva, and their family
corporation, the RRRC Development Corporation, executed a real estate mortgage in favor of private respondent Planters
Development Bank over five parcels of registered land to secure the payment of
a loan in the principal sum of P1,200,000.00.

When the petitioners failed to pay their obligation, Planters
caused the extra-judicial foreclosure of the mortgage in accordance with Act
No. 3135 as amended.  On May 15, 1984, a
public auction was held; the following day the sheriff issued a certificate of
sale in favor of Planters as the highest bidder.  The one-year period having expired without
the petitioners exercising their right of redemption, ownership of the five
parcels of land was transferred to the private respondent upon the issuance in
its name of new TCT Nos. 97073, 97074, 97075, 97076 and 97077 by the Register
of Deeds of Makati, Metro Manila.

Thereafter, Planters sent a letter of demand to the petitioners
to vacate the premises, but the demand was rejected.  It then filed a petition for the issuance of
a writ of possession pursuant to Section 6 of Act No. 3135 as amended before
the RTC-Makati, Branch 137.  This was
docketed as LRC Case No. M-1201.

When the petition was set for hearing on August 24, 1987, no
oppositor appeared nor was a written opposition filed.  Upon motion, Planters was allowed to present
its evidence ex parte.  On
October 2, 1987, however, the spouses Navarra and the RRRC Development Corporation filed their written
opposition, alleging inter alia that they were the plaintiffs in Civil
Case No. 16917 pending before the Regional Trial Court of Makati, Branch 145;
that they were the owners of the properties subject thereof which they had
acquired by virtue of a contract of sale; and that herein private respondent
had already been declared in default in the said civil case.  They added that the petition for the issuance of the writ of
possession was a mere ruse of
the private respondent.

Civil Case No. 16917 is a complaint for specific performance filed
by the petitioners on June 3, 1987, to compel the respondent bank to execute in their favor a deed of sale covering
the five lots involved in LRC Case No. M-1201.

Acting upon the written opposition, the trial court set the
hearing of the petition on November 16, 1987, to enable the oppositors to
present their evidence.  On December 8,
1987, Planters filed its comment/rejoinder to the opposition, and on December
14, 1987, the petitioners filed their sur-rejoinder.

The trial court reset the hearing of November 16, 1987, to
December 14, 1982, then to January 25, 1988, and finally to February 16,
1988.  The petitioners filed a written
manifestation stating that they were not presenting evidence and, citing the
case of Zaragoza vs. Diaz, 65 SCRA 315, argued – rather implausibly – that the
petition for a writ of possession should be dismissed because it was filed
after the one-year period of redemption.

On February 22, 1988, the trial court issued the assailed order
disposing as follows:

WHEREFORE, the petition is hereby granted, and let a writ of
possession issue, to be implemented by the Sheriff of this Court, by placing
the possession of the five (5) parcels of land, including all improvements
existing thereon, situated at Barangay San Dionisio, Parañaque, Metro Manila
covered by Transfer Certificate of Title Nos. 97073, 97074, 97075, 97076 and
97077, in favor of petitioner.

Their motion for reconsideration of the order having been denied
on May 20, 1988, the petitioners filed with the respondent Court of Appeals a special civil action for certiorari, alleging that the trial court
committed grave abuse of discretion amounting to lack of jurisdiction in
issuing the orders of February 22, 1988, and May 20, 1988.^[2]

The respondent court dismissed the petition on September 12,
1988, and denied the motion for reconsideration on December 22, 1988.  The petitioner then came to this Court for
relief under Rule 45 of the Rules of Court.

The petitioners agree that it is the ministerial duty of the
court to issue a writ of possession in favor of the highest bidder at the
public auction conducted in the extra-judicial foreclosure of the
mortgage.  This is authorized by Act No.
3135 as amended.  They also concede that as a rule any question
regarding the validity of the mortgage or of its foreclosure cannot be a legal
ground for refusing the issuance of the writ of possession.

But while the petitioners are not questioning these rules, they
submit that the writ of possession should not have been issued because they are
already the owners of the subject property by virtue of the perfected and
partially consummated contract of sale they had entered into with
Planters.  To prove their claim, they
presented to the respondent court an exchange of letters which the petitioners insist has established a
meeting of minds between them and Planters relative to their repurchase of the
subject properties.^[3]

The Court has examined these letters and finds that the alleged
repurchase involved only a house and lot and a restaurant building and lot while the assailed writ of
possession involved five lots in all. 
Remarkably, the letters were never presented in LRC Case No. M-1201, as
may be inferred from the following observation of the trial judge in the
assailed basic order:

The main thrust in the opposition is the claim by the
oppositors’ ownership over the properties subject matter of the petition.  It is their impression that a perfected sale was entered into between them and the
petitioner.  This Court has given them
the opportunity to present evidence in support of their stand but instead they
opted not to present evidence, and limited
themselves to filing a written manifestation inviting attention to the ruling
of the Supreme Court in the case of Zaragoza vs. Diaz (No. L-19462 July 25,
1975, 65 SCRA 315).

The petitioners also ask this Court to consider four letters
which they have attached to their petition, claiming these to be
newly-discovered evidence that would substantiate their allegation that they made a down payment of
P300,000 to the private respondent for the repurchase of the subject
properties.^[4]

As defined, newly-discovered evidence is evidence which could not
have been discovered prior to the trial in the court below by the exercise of
due diligence and which is of such character as would probably change the result.^[5]

The decision of the respondent Court of Appeals was promulgated
on September 12, 1988.  On the other
hand, the letters are dated October 24, 1988, and November 12, 1988.  As they were not existing at the time the respondent court rendered its
decision, and indeed prior to the trial, they could not by any kind of
diligence have been discovered at all during that period.  It is clear that they do not qualify as
newly-discovered evidence under the definition as they came into existence only
after the trial.

A no less important consideration is that the Rules of Court
allow only two occasions when a party may file a motion for new trial on
the ground of newly-discovered evidence. 
That motion may be filed only with the trial court under Rule 37 or with
the Court of Appeals under Rule 53 but never with the Supreme Court.^[6]

Time and again we have stressed that the Supreme Court is not a trier of
facts.  It is not the function of this
Court to analyze or weigh all over
again the
evidence already considered in the proceedings below, its jurisdiction being limited to reviewing only errors of law that may have been committed by the
lower courts.  Such review does not
extend to reversing the factual findings of such courts save only in the
exceptional instances we have laid
down in a number of decisions.^[7]

The petitioners cite the cases of Cometa vs. IAC, 151 SCRA 563,
and Barican vs. IAC, 162 SCRA 358, where this Court ordered deferment of the
issuance of the writ of possession pending resolution of the issue of ownership
of the disputed properties.

It is true that we did hold as follows in the Cometa case:

In the case at bar, the validity of the levy and sale of the
properties is directly put in issue in another case by the
petitioners.  This Court finds it an
issue which requires pre-emptive resolution. 
For if the respondent acquired no interest in the property by virtue of the
levy and sale, then, he is not entitled to its possession.

However, there were peculiar circumstances in that case which are
not present in the case at bar, to wit:

Moreover, equitable  considerations
constrain us to reverse the decision of the respondent court.  The fact is undisputed that the properties
in question were sold at an unusually
lower price than their true value. 
Properties worth at least P500,000.00 were sold for only P57,396.85.  We
do not comment on the consequences of the inadequacy because that is the very
issue which confronts the court below in the pending case.  It appearing, however, that the issuance of
the writ of possession would and might work injustice because the petitioner
might not be entitled thereto, we rule that it be withheld.  (Emphasis supplied.)

The facts in the Barican case
are also different
because –

In the instant case, the petition for the issuance of an alias writ
of possession was set for hearing. 
During the hearing, the lower court discovered certain facts, among
them:  In Civil Case No. C-11232, the
petitioner-spouses claim ownership of the foreclosed property against the
respondent bank and Nicanor Reyes to whom the former sold the property by negotiated sale; the complaint alleged that
the DBP knew the assumption of mortgage between the mortgagors and the petitioner-spouses and the latter have
paid to the respondent bank certain amounts to update the loan balances of the
mortgagors and transfer and restructuring fees which payments are duly
receipted; the petitioner-spouses were already in possession of the property since
September 28, 1979 and long before the respondent bank sold the same property
to respondent Nicanor Reyes on October 28, 1984; and the respondent bank never
took physical possession of the property.

Under these circumstances, the obligation of a court to issue a writ of possession in favor of the purchaser in a foreclosure of
mortgage case ceases to be ministerial.

In the said case, this Court took into account the circumstances
that as early as 1979 the
judgment debtor was no longer in possession of the disputed property and that
there was a pending civil case involving the rights of third parties, namely,
the petitioner-spouses.  No such third
parties are involved in the case at bar, the controversy being confined only to
Planters, as
mortgagee, and the Navarra spouses, as mortgagors.

The purchaser at an extra-judicial foreclosure sale has a right
to the possession of the property even during the one-year period of redemption
provided he files an indemnity bond. 
After the lapse of the said period with no redemption having been made,
that right becomes absolute and may be demanded by the buyer even without the
posting of a bond.  Possession may then
be obtained under a writ which may be applied for ex parte pursuant to Section 7, of Act 3135 as amended by Act 4118 as
follows:

Sec. 7.  In any sale made
under the provisions of this Act, the purchaser may petition the Court of First
Instance of the province or place where the property or any part thereof is situated, to give him
possession thereof during the redemption period, furnishing bond in an amount
equivalent to the use of the property for a period of twelve months, to
indemnify the debtor in case it be shown that the sale was made without
violating the mortgage or without complying with the requirements of this
Act.  Such petition shall be made under
oath and filed in form of an ex parte motion in the registration or cadastral
proceedings if the property is registered, or in special proceedings in the
case of property registered under the Mortgage Law or under section one hundred
and ninety-four of the Administrative Code or of any other real property
encumbered with a mortgage duly registered in the office of any register of
deeds in accordance with any existing law, and in each case
the clerk of the court shall, upon the filing of such petition, collect the
fees specified in paragraph eleven of section one hundred and
fourteen of Act Numbered Four hundred and ninety-six, as amended by Act
Numbered Twenty-eight hundred and sixty-six, and the court shall, upon approval
of the bond, order that a writ of possession issue, addressed to the sheriff of
the province in which the property is situated, who shall execute said order
immediately.

Applying this provision, the respondent Court of Appeals
correctly observed:

Let it be stressed that, while it is true that the claim of
ownership over the five (5) parcels of land is pending litigation in Civil Case
No. 16917, until and unless the lower court
in said case has finally adjudicated the ownership thereof to petitioners,
private respondent cannot be deprived of its right of possession over the same
since the right of private respondent springs from the failure of petitioners
to redeem the foreclosed properties within the one-year period granted by law
and the consequent issuance of new transfer certificates of title in its
name.  Consequently, the claim of
ownership, allegedly in view of a perfected
contract of sale, is left to be determined in Civil Case No. 16917.  The same cannot be raised as a justification
for opposing the issuance of a writ of possession since, under Sec. 7 of Act
No. 3135 as amended, the proceeding is ex parte.  x x x.

There being no dispute that
the lands were not redeemed within one year from the registration of the
extrajudicial foreclosure sale, it should follow that the private respondent
has acquired an absolute right, as purchaser,
to the writ of possession.  The land
registration court has the ministerial duty to issue that writ upon mere
motion, conformably to the afore-cited Section 7.

The question of the ownership of the land or the alleged
perfected or consummated sale can be threshed out in Civil Case No. 16917,
which is still pending.  What we are
holding here only is that because that question could not be raised in the
petition for the issuance of the writ of possession in LRC Case No. M-1201, the
order of the trial judge
granting the petition was conformable to law.

WHEREFORE, the challenged decision of the Court of Appeals
is AFFIRMED, with costs against the petitioner.

Narvasa, C.J., Griño-Aquino, and
Medialdea, JJ., concur.

^[1]
Penned by Ordoñez-Benitez, J., with Bellosillo and Kalalo, JJ.,
concurring.

^[2]
Through Judge Santiago Ranada, Jr.

^[3]
Rollo, pp. 217-221; Annex “A,”
“B,” “C,” and “D,” Memorandum for the
petitioners.

^[4]
Rollo, pp. 145-148; Annex “T,”
“U,” “V,” and “W,” Petition.

^[5] Rule 53, Section 1, Revised Rules of Court.

^[6]
Cuenca vs. Cuenca, 168 SCRA 335.

^[7]
Medina vs. Asistio, 191 SCRA 218; SSS vs. CA, 177 SCRA 1;
Reynolds Philippines Corp. vs. CA, 169 SCRA 220; Apex Investment and
Financing Corp. vs. IAC, 166 SCRA 458; Bunag vs. CA, 158 SCRA
299.