Thursday, January 24, 2013

Leonardo vs. Maravilla


LEONARDO v. MARAVILLA
GR No. 143369 November 27, 2002

FACTS:
Mariano Torres, predecessor-in-interest of respondents, owns a parcel of land covered by TCT No. 2355 (34515). The said land was sold by Mariano to Eusebio Roxas but the latter was not able to register the same due to a legal dispute between Mariano and a certain Francisco Fernandez. Mariano eventually won that case in 1972.

Petitioner now buys the lot from Eusebio Roxas and asked that it be registered under his name. He was not able to do so because the Owner’s Duplicate Certificate of Title (ODCT) was still in the hands of respondents and that the Register of Deeds made an affidavit that the original copy of TCT No. 2355 (34515) could not be retrieved or located in their office. Petitioner files an adverse claim. On May 1993, the Register of Deeds found the original TCT of the land and annotated thereon the adverse claim filed by petitioner on May 20, 1993.

Petitioner claims that he is the lawful owner of said land having purchased it from Eusebio Roxas and having protected his rights through the annotation of adverse claim when the register of Deeds found the Original TCT. Respondents counter that the action has been barred by prescription and laches, it being filed only 21 years from the time the right of action has commenced. Petitioner claims that his action is an accion reivindicatoria which prescribes in 30 years.

ISSUE:
                Whether or not petitioner’s action is barred by prescription and laches.

HELD:
                Yes. Petitioner’s action is actually an action for specific performance. It is a fundamental principle that ownership does not pass by mere stipulation but by delivery. The delivery of a thing constitutes a necessary and indispensable requisite for the purpose of acquiring the ownership of the same by virtue of a contract. The execution of the contract is only a presumptive, not conclusive delivery which can be rebutted by evidence to the contrary, as when there is failure on the part of the vendee to take material possession of the land subject of the sale in the concept of a purchaser-owner.

Since in this jurisdiction it is a fundamental and elementary principle that ownership does not pass by mere stipulation but only by delivery, and the execution of a public document does not constitute sufficient delivery where the property involved is in the actual and adverse possession of third persons, it becomes incontestable that even if included in the contract, the ownership of the property in dispute did not pass.

Clearly, the case filed by petitioner was an action for specific performance of a written contract of sale which, pursuant to Article 1144 of the Civil Code, prescribes in 10 years from the accrual of the right of action. the annotation on May 20, 1993 of the November 13, 1972 affidavit of adverse claim on TCT No. 2355 (34515) afforded no protection to petitioner for the same reason that said belated assertion of his alleged right over the property is barred by prescription and laches.

Moreover, the affidavit of adverse claim registered by petitioner in 1972 was ineffective. The law enforced at the time petitioner filed an adverse claim was Section 110 of Act 496, also known as the Land Registration Act.

Likewise, there is no merit in petitioner's assertion that the prescriptive period should commence to run only on May 18, 1993 when the original copy of Transfer Certificate of Title No. 2355 (34515) was retrieved by the Register of Deeds. The loss of the original title will not prevent petitioner’s pursuit to enforce his right. Otherwise stated, the recovery of the original title or the reconstitution thereof is not the only means by which petitioner could protect his right. Under Article 1155 of the Civil Code - "[t]he prescription of actions is interrupted when they are filed in court, when there is a written extrajudicial demand by the creditors, and when there is any written acknowledgement of the debt by the debtor." Petitioner therefore may pursue either judicial or extrajudicial means manifesting his interest in the questioned property in order to interrupt the prescriptive period.

Certainly, petitioner’s action filed on September 6, 1993 is barred by the 10 year prescriptive period from the accrual of his alleged right of action on September 29, 1972. In the same vein, said action is barred by laches having allowed 21 years to lapse before enforcing his alleged right. Laches is defined as failure or neglect for an unreasonable and unexplained length of time, to do that which, by exercising due diligence could or should have been done earlier. It is negligence or omission to assert a right within a reasonable time, warranting presumption that the party entitled to assert it has abandoned it or has declined to assert it.



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