MANILA, Philippines – Affirming a Court of Appeals (CA) decision, the Supreme Court (SC) has ruled that courts may make a provisional determination on whether a party is alive or deceased in an ejectment case, when such a finding is necessary to resolve the issue of who holds the right to possess the property.
This determination, however, is merely provisional and applies exclusively to the ejectment proceedings, according to Chief Justice Alexander Gesmundo, who penned the ruling of the high court’s First Division which denied the appeal filed by Belinda E. Soriano and her relatives in a case brought against them by Antonio V. Estrella.
Records showed that Estrella claimed ownership over a property in Quezon City, where Soriano and others resided with his permission. When they refused to vacate the property following his demand in 2012—so that he could proceed with renovations—Estrella filed an unlawful detainer case.
This is a form of ejectment action used to recover possession from occupants whose initial stay was lawful but later became unauthorized, the Court said.
Soriano and others sought the dismissal of the case, arguing that Estrella lacked the legal capacity to sue, alleging that he had already passed away in 1990. They submitted his death certificate as evidence in support of their claim.
Both the Metropolitan Trial Court and the Regional Trial Court sided with Soriano and others, ruling that courts must recognize the death certificate unless it has been duly canceled.
However, the appellate court reversed the lower courts' decisions. It found that the death certificate was contradicted by multiple pieces of evidence, including Estrella's valid driver's license, her and others' own admission that he was the registered owner of the property, and a criminal complaint they had filed against him in 2013.
In doing so, the high tribunal clarified that while the proper remedy for canceling a death certificate or correcting a civil registry entry is to file a petition for cancelation, this does not preclude courts hearing ejectment cases from making a provisional determination on whether a party is alive or dead, when such a determination is essential to resolving the issue of possession.
It then stressed that ejectment cases are summary proceedings designed to resolve disputes over physical possession of property expeditiously. Requiring the parties to first secure the cancellation of the death certificate would defeat this purpose, it pointed out.
Accordingly, the high court held that a judicial finding on the life or death of a party in an ejectment case is limited to determining that party's legal capacity to sue and their right to physical possession of the property.
In this case, the Court found that Estrella had successfully overcome the presumption created by the death certificate. The parties themselves acknowledged that the Estrella who filed the case was the same Estrella named in the property's title.
Soriano and others never alleged that he was an impostor or disputed his identity. This fact, together with Estrella's living presence in court, confirmed his legal capacity to sue.
It further ruled that all the elements of unlawful detainer were satisfied. Soriano and others initially had lawful possession of the property; however, such possession became unlawful upon their refusal to comply with Estrella's demand to vacate.
Estrella then filed the case within the one-year period prescribed by law, thereby complying with the jurisdictional requirements, the high tribunal said.
