January 2010 - Philippine Supreme Court Decisions/Resolutions
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[G.R. No. 174356 : January 20, 2010] EVELINA G. CHAVEZ AND AIDA CHAVEZ-DELES, PETITIONERS, VS. COURT OF APPEALS AND ATTY. FIDELA Y. VARGAS, RESPONDENTS. :
[G.R. No. 174356 : January 20, 2010]
EVELINA G. CHAVEZ AND AIDA CHAVEZ-DELES, PETITIONERS, VS. COURT OF APPEALS AND ATTY. FIDELA Y. VARGAS, RESPONDENTS.
D E C I S I O N
ABAD, J.:
This case is about the propriety of the Court of Appeals (CA), which hears the case on appeal, placing the property in dispute under receivership upon a claim that the defendant has been remiss in making an accounting to the plaintiff of the fruits of such property.
The Facts and the Case
Respondent Fidela Y. Vargas owned a five-hectare mixed coconut land and rice fields in Sorsogon. Petitioner Evelina G. Chavez had been staying in a remote portion of the land with her family, planting coconut seedlings on the land and supervising the harvest of coconut and palay. Fidela and Evelina agreed to divide the gross sales of all products from the land between themselves. Since Fidela was busy with her law practice, Evelina undertook to hold in trust for Fidela her half of the profits.
But Fidela claimed that Evelina had failed to remit her share of the profits and, despite demand to turn over the administration of the property to Fidela, had refused to do so. Consequently, Fidela filed a complaint against Evelina and her daughter, Aida C. Deles, who was assisting her mother, for recovery of possession, rent, and damages with prayer for the immediate appointment of a receiver before the Regional Trial Court (RTC) of Bulan, Sorsogon.[1] In their answer, Evelina and Aida claimed that the RTC did not have jurisdiction over the subject matter of the case since it actually involved an agrarian dispute.
After hearing, the RTC dismissed the complaint for lack of jurisdiction based on Fidela's admission that Evelina and Aida were tenants who helped plant coconut seedlings on the land and supervised the harvest of coconut and palay. As tenants, the defendants also shared in the gross sales of the harvest. The court threw out Fidela's claim that, since Evelina and her family received the land already planted with fruit-bearing trees, they could not be regarded as tenants. Cultivation, said the court, included the tending and caring of the trees. The court also regarded as relevant Fidela's pending application for a five-hectare retention and Evelina's pending protest relative to her three-hectare beneficiary share.[2]
Dissatisfied, Fidela appealed to the CA. She also filed with that court a motion for the appointment of a receiver. On April 12, 2006 the CA granted the motion and ordained receivership of the land, noting that there appeared to be a need to preserve the property and its fruits in light of Fidela's allegation that Evelina and Aida failed to account for her share of such fruits.[3]
Parenthetically, Fidela also filed three estafa cases with the RTC of Olongapo City and a complaint for dispossession with the Department of Agrarian Reform Adjudication Board (DARAB) against Evelina and Aida. In all these cases, Fidela asked for the immediate appointment of a receiver for the property.
The Issues Presented
Petitioners present the following issues:
The Court's Ruling
One. By forum shopping, a party initiates two or more actions in separate tribunals, grounded on the same cause, trusting that one or the other tribunal would favorably dispose of the matter.[4] The elements of forum shopping are the same as in litis pendentia where the final judgment in one case will amount to res judicata in the other. The elements of forum shopping are: (1) identity of parties, or at least such parties as would represent the same interest in both actions; (2) identity of rights asserted and relief prayed for, the relief being founded on the same facts; and (3) identity of the two preceding particulars such that any judgment rendered in the other action will, regardless of which party is successful, amount to res judicata in the action under consideration.[5]
Here, however, the various suits Fidela initiated against Evelina and Aida involved different causes of action and sought different reliefs. The present civil action that she filed with the RTC sought to recover possession of the property based on Evelina and Aida's failure to account for its fruits. The estafa cases she filed with the RTC accused the two of misappropriating and converting her share in the harvests for their own benefit. Her complaint for dispossession under Republic Act 8048 with the DARAB sought to dispossess the two for allegedly cutting coconut trees without the prior authority of Fidela or of the Philippine Coconut Authority.
The above cases are similar only in that they involved the same parties and Fidela sought the placing of the properties under receivership in all of them. But receivership is not an action. It is but an auxiliary remedy, a mere incident of the suit to help achieve its purpose. Consequently, it cannot be said that the grant of receivership in one case will amount to res judicata on the merits of the other cases. The grant or denial of this provisional remedy will still depend on the need for it in the particular action.
Two. In any event, we hold that the CA erred in granting receivership over the property in dispute in this case. For one thing, a petition for receivership under Section 1(b), Rule 59 of the Rules of Civil Procedure requires that the property or fund subject of the action is in danger of being lost, removed, or materially injured, necessitating its protection or preservation. Its object is the prevention of imminent danger to the property. If the action does not require such protection or preservation, the remedy is not receivership.[6]
Here Fidela's main gripe is that Evelina and Aida deprived her of her share of the land's produce. She does not claim that the land or its productive capacity would disappear or be wasted if not entrusted to a receiver. Nor does Fidela claim that the land has been materially injured, necessitating its protection and preservation. Because receivership is a harsh remedy that can be granted only in extreme situations,[7] Fidela must prove a clear right to its issuance. But she has not. Indeed, in none of the other cases she filed against Evelina and Aida has that remedy been granted her.[8]
Besides, the RTC dismissed Fidela's action for lack of jurisdiction over the case, holding that the issues it raised properly belong to the DARAB. The case before the CA is but an offshoot of that RTC case. Given that the RTC has found that it had no jurisdiction over the case, it would seem more prudent for the CA to first provisionally determine that the RTC had jurisdiction before granting receivership which is but an incident of the main action.
WHEREFORE, the Court GRANTS the petition. The Resolutions dated April 12, 2006 and July 7, 2006 of the Court of Appeals in CA-G.R. CV 85552, are REVERSED and SET ASIDE.
The receivership is LIFTED and the Court of Appeals is directed to resolve CA-G.R. CV 85552 with utmost dispatch.
SO ORDERED.
Carpio, Brion, Del Castillo, and Perez, JJ., concur.
Respondent Fidela Y. Vargas owned a five-hectare mixed coconut land and rice fields in Sorsogon. Petitioner Evelina G. Chavez had been staying in a remote portion of the land with her family, planting coconut seedlings on the land and supervising the harvest of coconut and palay. Fidela and Evelina agreed to divide the gross sales of all products from the land between themselves. Since Fidela was busy with her law practice, Evelina undertook to hold in trust for Fidela her half of the profits.
But Fidela claimed that Evelina had failed to remit her share of the profits and, despite demand to turn over the administration of the property to Fidela, had refused to do so. Consequently, Fidela filed a complaint against Evelina and her daughter, Aida C. Deles, who was assisting her mother, for recovery of possession, rent, and damages with prayer for the immediate appointment of a receiver before the Regional Trial Court (RTC) of Bulan, Sorsogon.[1] In their answer, Evelina and Aida claimed that the RTC did not have jurisdiction over the subject matter of the case since it actually involved an agrarian dispute.
After hearing, the RTC dismissed the complaint for lack of jurisdiction based on Fidela's admission that Evelina and Aida were tenants who helped plant coconut seedlings on the land and supervised the harvest of coconut and palay. As tenants, the defendants also shared in the gross sales of the harvest. The court threw out Fidela's claim that, since Evelina and her family received the land already planted with fruit-bearing trees, they could not be regarded as tenants. Cultivation, said the court, included the tending and caring of the trees. The court also regarded as relevant Fidela's pending application for a five-hectare retention and Evelina's pending protest relative to her three-hectare beneficiary share.[2]
Dissatisfied, Fidela appealed to the CA. She also filed with that court a motion for the appointment of a receiver. On April 12, 2006 the CA granted the motion and ordained receivership of the land, noting that there appeared to be a need to preserve the property and its fruits in light of Fidela's allegation that Evelina and Aida failed to account for her share of such fruits.[3]
Parenthetically, Fidela also filed three estafa cases with the RTC of Olongapo City and a complaint for dispossession with the Department of Agrarian Reform Adjudication Board (DARAB) against Evelina and Aida. In all these cases, Fidela asked for the immediate appointment of a receiver for the property.
Petitioners present the following issues:
1. Whether or not respondent Fidela is guilty of forum shopping considering that she had earlier filed identical applications for receivership over the subject properties in the criminal cases she filed with the RTC of Olongapo City against petitioners Evelina and Aida and in the administrative case that she filed against them before the DARAB; and
2. Whether or not the CA erred in granting respondent Fidela's application for receivership.
One. By forum shopping, a party initiates two or more actions in separate tribunals, grounded on the same cause, trusting that one or the other tribunal would favorably dispose of the matter.[4] The elements of forum shopping are the same as in litis pendentia where the final judgment in one case will amount to res judicata in the other. The elements of forum shopping are: (1) identity of parties, or at least such parties as would represent the same interest in both actions; (2) identity of rights asserted and relief prayed for, the relief being founded on the same facts; and (3) identity of the two preceding particulars such that any judgment rendered in the other action will, regardless of which party is successful, amount to res judicata in the action under consideration.[5]
Here, however, the various suits Fidela initiated against Evelina and Aida involved different causes of action and sought different reliefs. The present civil action that she filed with the RTC sought to recover possession of the property based on Evelina and Aida's failure to account for its fruits. The estafa cases she filed with the RTC accused the two of misappropriating and converting her share in the harvests for their own benefit. Her complaint for dispossession under Republic Act 8048 with the DARAB sought to dispossess the two for allegedly cutting coconut trees without the prior authority of Fidela or of the Philippine Coconut Authority.
The above cases are similar only in that they involved the same parties and Fidela sought the placing of the properties under receivership in all of them. But receivership is not an action. It is but an auxiliary remedy, a mere incident of the suit to help achieve its purpose. Consequently, it cannot be said that the grant of receivership in one case will amount to res judicata on the merits of the other cases. The grant or denial of this provisional remedy will still depend on the need for it in the particular action.
Two. In any event, we hold that the CA erred in granting receivership over the property in dispute in this case. For one thing, a petition for receivership under Section 1(b), Rule 59 of the Rules of Civil Procedure requires that the property or fund subject of the action is in danger of being lost, removed, or materially injured, necessitating its protection or preservation. Its object is the prevention of imminent danger to the property. If the action does not require such protection or preservation, the remedy is not receivership.[6]
Here Fidela's main gripe is that Evelina and Aida deprived her of her share of the land's produce. She does not claim that the land or its productive capacity would disappear or be wasted if not entrusted to a receiver. Nor does Fidela claim that the land has been materially injured, necessitating its protection and preservation. Because receivership is a harsh remedy that can be granted only in extreme situations,[7] Fidela must prove a clear right to its issuance. But she has not. Indeed, in none of the other cases she filed against Evelina and Aida has that remedy been granted her.[8]
Besides, the RTC dismissed Fidela's action for lack of jurisdiction over the case, holding that the issues it raised properly belong to the DARAB. The case before the CA is but an offshoot of that RTC case. Given that the RTC has found that it had no jurisdiction over the case, it would seem more prudent for the CA to first provisionally determine that the RTC had jurisdiction before granting receivership which is but an incident of the main action.
WHEREFORE, the Court GRANTS the petition. The Resolutions dated April 12, 2006 and July 7, 2006 of the Court of Appeals in CA-G.R. CV 85552, are REVERSED and SET ASIDE.
The receivership is LIFTED and the Court of Appeals is directed to resolve CA-G.R. CV 85552 with utmost dispatch.
SO ORDERED.
Carpio, Brion, Del Castillo, and Perez, JJ., concur.
Endnotes:
[1] Branch 65.
[2] Rollo, pp. 59-64.
[3] Id. at 13-15. Penned by Associate Justice Hakim S. Abdulwahid, with Associate Justices Remedios A. Salazar-Fernando and Estela M. Perlas-Bernabe concurring.
[4] Philippine National Construction Corporation v. Dy, G.R. No. 156887, October 3, 2005, 472 SCRA 1, 6.
[5] Cruz v. Caraos, G.R. No. 138208, April 23, 2007, 521 SCRA 510, 522.
[6] Commodities Storage & Ice Plant Corp. v. Court of Appeals, G.R. No. 125008, June 19, 1997, 274 SCRA 439, 446-447.
[7] Vivares v. Reyes, G.R. No. 155408, February 13, 2008, 545 SCRA 80, 87.
[8] Rollo, pp. 93, 205-208, 295-301.
