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[G.R. No. 154467.� February 21, 2005]
MEYCAUAYAN CORP vs. GARCIA
SECOND DIVISION
Gentlemen:
Quoted hereunder, for your information, is a resolution of this Court dated FEB 21 2005.
G.R. No. 154467 (Meycauayan Central Realty Corporation vs. Hon. Alfonso S. Garcia, Presiding Judge of RTC, Tagaytay City, Branch 18, Heirs of Manuel A. Roxas and Trinidad De Leon Vda. De Roxas, represented by Ruby Roxas as Administrator, Maguesun Management and Development Corporation, Register of Deeds of Tagaytay City, Land Registration Authority and the City Assessor of Tagaytay City.)
RESOLUTION
Before the Court are the Petition for Review on Certiorari, private respondents' Comment thereto and petitioner's Reply. Subsequently, private respondents also filed a Manifestation stating that the instant petition has become moot and academic in view of this Court's (First Division) Decision in the petition for contempt docketed as G.R. No. 138660. Petitioner then filed its Comment to such manifestation.
In the present petition, petitioner seeks the reversal of the Court of Appeals' judgment upholding the Order dated March 7, 2000 issued by the Regional Trial Court of Tagaytay City dismissing herein petitioner's complaint for "Reconveyance, Damages, and Quieting of Title and the Order denying the motion for reconsideration thereof." The trial court dismissed said complaint on the ground of res judicata and for herein petitioner's act of forum-shopping. Petitioner filed a petition for certiorari before the Court of Appeals but said petition was likewise dismissed as the Court of Appeals found no grave abuse of discretion committed by the trial court in dismissing said complaint.
Petitioner then filed the present petition for review on certiorari. Private respondents filed their Comment on the petition, to which petitioner replied. Subsequently, private respondents filed the aforementioned Manifestation praying that this petition be dismissed for being moot and academic in view of the finality of the Court's Decision in G.R. No. 138660 entitled Heirs of Trinidad De Leon Vda. De Roxas vs. Court of Appeals and Maguesun Management and Development Corporation, [1] cralaw where it was ruled that the Court's Decision in G.R. No. 118436 entitled Heirs of Manuel A. Roxas and Trinidad De Leon Vda. De Roxas vs. Court of Appeals and Maguesun Management & Development Corporation, [2] is binding on herein petitioner, and that the latter's act of filing an action for reconveyance, quieting of title and damages, subject of this present petition, involving the very same parcels of land which this Court has decided with finality to be owned by private respondents, constitutes contempt and forum-shopping.
Essentially, the issues raised in the present petition are (1) whether the decision in G.R. No. 118436 is binding on petitioner and (2) whether private respondents Heirs of Manuel A. Roxas and Trinidad De Leon Vda. De Roxas had indeed been in possession of the disputed properties in the concept of owner for more than thirty years, hi the petition and in its comment to private respondents' manifestation, petitioner insists that it was never even impleaded as a party in G.R. No. 138660 or G.R. No. 118436, therefore, the Court's decision in said cases cannot be binding on petitioner as it is a complete stranger to said actions. It also reiterates its argument that it was a purchaser in good faith of the disputed properties and was deprived of the right to defend its rights and interests over the same when herein private respondents intentionally did not inform the court that herein petitioner, a necessary and indispensable party, had acquired a portion of said property from Maguesun Management and Development Corporation.
The Court has resolved the aforementioned issues with finality against herein petitioner.
In G.R. No. 118436, [3] cralaw the Court ruled that petitioners therein (herein private respondents) retained title to subject properties proper and sufficient for original registration over the disputed parcels of land. It also found that Maguesun Management and Development Corporation, petitioner's predecessor-in-interest, committed actual fraud in obtaining the decree of registration in its favor over the properties in dispute, as it was the Roxas family who had been in uninterrupted possession of said properties in the concept of owner for thirty years. The Court further ruled that Maguesun Management and Development Corporation is not an "innocent purchaser for value" who merits the protection of the law. The Court's decision in said case became final and executory on August 21, 1997. [4] cralaw Clearly, therefore, the second issue of who had proper title over subject properties is settled and could no longer be re-litigated.
In G.R. No. 138660, [5] cralaw it was emphasized that:
The issue of whether the Decision in G.R. No. 118436 binds Meycauayan was already addressed by this Court when it denied Meycauayan's Petition for Intervention. Furthermore, this Court's Resolution dated 29 July 1998 clarified the Decision dated 21 March 1997 by ordering the Register of Deeds to CANCEL OCT No. 0-515 and all its derivative titles, namely TCT Nos. T-25625, T-25626, T-25627, T-25628, T-25689, and T-25690, the latter three already in the name of Meycauayan Realty and Development Corporation (also designated as "Meycauayan Central Realty, Inc." and "Meycauayan Realty Corporation"). This Court also found that there had been no intervening rights of an innocent purchaser for value involving the lots in dispute.
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The fact that this Court specifically ordered the cancellation of Meycauayan's titles to the disputed parcels of land in the Resolution dated 29 July 1998 should have laid to rest the issue whether the Decision and Resolution in G.R. No. 118436 are binding on Meycauayan. xxx
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There is substantial identity of parties when there is community of interest or privity of interest between a party in the first and a party in the second case even if the first case did not implead the latter.
The Court ruled in G.R. No. 118436 that Meycauayan's predecessor-in-interest, Maguesun, committed actual fraud in obtaining the decree of registration of the subject properties. The Decision in G.R. No. 118436 binds Meycauayan under the principle of "privity of interest" since it was a successor-in-interest of Maguesun. xxx
Furthermore, as found by this Court in G.R. No. 118436, the Roxas family has been in possession of the property uninterruptedly through their caretaker, Jose Ramirez, who resided on the property. Where the land sold is in the possession of a person other than the vendor, the purchaser must go beyond the certificates of title and make inquiries concerning the rights of the actual possessor. Meycauayan therefore cannot invoke the right of a purchaser in good faith and could not have acquired a better right than its predecessor-in-interest. This Court has already rejected Meycauayan's claim that it was a purchaser in good faith when it ruled in G.R. No. 118436 that there had been no intervening rights of an innocent purchaser for value involving the lots in dispute. xxx
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In this case, the Court had already rejected Meycauayan's claim on the subject lots when the Court denied Meycauayan's Petition for Intervention in G.R. No. 118436. The Court ruled that there had been no intervening rights of an innocent purchaser for value involving the lots in dispute. The Decision of this Court in G.R. No. 118436 is already final and executory. The filing by Meycauayan of an action to re-litigate the title to the same property, which this Court had already adjudicated with finality, is an abuse of the court's processes and constitutes direct contempt.
The foregoing pronouncements of this Court have settled beyond any doubt the issues raised in this petition and clearly show that the Regional Trial Court of Tagaytay City, as upheld by the Court of Appeals, committed no error in dismissing petitioner's complaint for reconveyance, damages, and quieting of title.
Petitioner should be reminded of the concept of conclusiveness of judgment, which was again explained by the Court in Cayana vs. Court of Appeals, [6] cralaw thus:
xxx conclusiveness of judgment-states that a fact or question which was in issue in a former suit and there was judicially passed upon and determined by a court of competent jurisdiction, is conclusively settled by the judgment therein as far as the parties to that action and persons in privity with them are concerned and cannot be again litigated in any future action between such parties or their privies, in the same court or any other court of concurrent jurisdiction on either the same or different cause of action, while the judgment remains unreversed by proper authority. It has been held that in order that a judgment in one action can be conclusive as to a particular matter in another action between the same parties or their privies, it is essential that the issue be identical. If a particular point or question is in issue in the second action, and the judgment will depend on the determination of that particular point or question, a former judgment between the same parties or their privies will be final and conclusive in the second if that same point or question was in issue and adjudicated in the first suit. Identity of cause of action is not required but merely identity of issues. (Emphasis supplied)
Thus, even if G.R. No. 138660 involves a petition for contempt, while the present petition is one for review on certiorari assailing the propriety of the issuance by the trial court of the order dismissing petitioner's complaint, the Court's resolution of the issues in G.R. No. 138660, which are the very same issues raised herein, is conclusive in the present case.
IN VIEW OF THE FOREGOING, the petition is hereby dismissed for utter lack of merit.
SO ORDERED.
Very truly yours,
(Sgd.) LUDICHI YASAY-NUNAG
Clerk of Court
Endnotes:
[1] cralaw Promulgated on February 5, 2004.
[2] cralaw G.R. No. 118436, March 21, 1997, 270 SCRA 309.
[3] cralaw Id.
[4] cralaw See third paragraph of Decision in G.R. No. 138660.
[5] cralaw See Note 1.
[6] cralaw G.R. No. 125607, March 18, 2004, citing Calalang vs. Register of Deeds of Quezon City, G.R. Nos. 76265 and 83280, March 11, 1994, 231 SCRA 88.
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