Philippine Supreme Court Resolutions > Year 2010 > March 2010 Resolutions > [G.R. No. 160363 : March 10, 2010] VIRGILIO C. CARDINOZA V. EVANGELINE M. CARAAN. GLORIA MANALO INFANTE, NATALIA DELOS REYES, JONALYN BERNARDO MORADA, MARITES MATULAC, DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE, HON. JOVENCITO ZUNO, AND HON. MA. MERCEDITAS GUTIERREZ, STATE PROSECUTOR JOCELYN ONG :

Quoted hereunder, for your information, is a resolution of the First Division of this  Court dated  10 March 2010

G.R. No. 160363 - VIRGILIO C. CARDINOZA v. EVANGELINE M. CARAAN. GLORIA MANALO INFANTE, NATALIA DELOS REYES, JONALYN BERNARDO MORADA, MARITES MATULAC, DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE, HON. JOVENCITO ZUNO, AND HON. MA. MERCEDITAS GUTIERREZ, STATE PROSECUTOR JOCELYN ONG:- Via  petition for certiorari directly filed in this Court, the petitioner ascribes grave abuse of discretion to the Department of Justice (DOJ), represented by then Undersecretary (now Ombudsman) Ma. Merceditas N. Gutierrez, for dismissing his petition for review through the assailed resolutions issued on August 13, 2001 and August 28, 2003 in I.S. No. 99-1928 on the ground of his non-compliance with the requirements on appeal laid down in DOJ Department Circular No. 70 (2000 National Prosecution Service Rules on Appeal). He claims that the public respondent thereby committed grave abuse of discretion amounting to lack of jurisdiction in ruling that there was probable cause to charge him with estafa and in dismissing his petition for review based upon a technicality.

Apparently, the issues to be passed upon in this petition are: (a) whether or not the dismissal of the petitioner's petition for review was proper; and (b) whether or not there is sufficient evidence to sustain a finding of probable cause for the crime of estafa, defined and penalized under Article 315 of the Revised Penal Code, against the petitioner.

The petition is devoid of merit.

The DOJ is a quasi-judicial agency because it exercises quasi-judicial functions in the review of the finding of probable cause. The petition for certiorari should have been filed in the Court of Appeals. Thus, the petitioner disregarded the hierarchy of courts clearly provided for in Section 4, Rule 65, 1997 Rules of Civil Procedure, as amended, which requires that: "If the petition involves an act or an omission of a quasi-judicial agency, unless otherwise provided by law or these rules, the petition shall be filed with and be cognizable only by the Court of Appeals." Also, the petition for review taken pursuant to DOJ Department Circular No. 70 was defective. The circular enumerates the requirements for an appeal to the DOJ to prosper, and apprises the appealing party of the consequences of the non-observance of the requirements. The petitioner undoubtedly did not submit numerous essential documents to support his appeal in the DOJ. Hence, the dismissal of the appeal by the DOJ, being in accordance with the rules laid down in Department Circular No. 70, did not constitute abuse of discretion, least of all grave. The right to appeal is merely statutory, and the petitioner, as the party availing himself of the right, must comply with the statute or rule establishing and regulating the invocation of the right.

WHEREFORE, the petition for certiorari is dismissed.

SO ORDERED.

WITNESS the Honorable Chief Justice Reynato S. Puno, Chairperson, Honorable Justice Conchita Carpio Morales, Working Chairperson, Honorable Justices Teresita Leonardo de Castro, Lucas P. Bersamin, and Martin S. Villarama, Jr., Members, First Division, this 10th day of March 2010.