Facts:
Lupo Mariategui
died without a will in 1953. During his lifetime, Lupo contracted 3
marriages. The first wife died, so he contracted a second marriage. The
second wife also died so he contracted a third marriage. The third wife also
preceded Lupo in death in 1941.
At the time of his death, Lupo left certain properties which he acquired when he was still single. Lupo’s descendants by his first and second marriages executed a deed of extrajudicial partition whereby they adjudicated unto themselves the lots left by Lupo. The lots were subdivided and separate certificate of titles were issued to the respective parties.
Now, the children
of Lupo by his third marriage filed with the lower court an amended
complaint for partition of the estate of their deceased father and
annulment of the deed of extrajudicial partition, claiming they were
co-heirs deprived of their respective shares in the lot mentioned. The
other party answered that the complaint was not really for annulment
of the deed of extrajudicial partition but for recognition of natural
children.
The lower court ruled in favor of Lupo’s heirs from the first and second marriage. They Court of Appeals reversed the ruling. Hence, the appeal.
Issues:
1. Whether or
not prescription barred private respondents' right to demand the partition of
the estate of Lupo Mariategui
2. Whether or not
the private respondents, who belatedly filed the action for recognition, were
able to prove their successional rights over said estate
Held:
Existence of
Marriage
Lupo Mariategui and Felipa Velasco
were alleged to have been lawfully married in or about 1930. This fact is based
on the declaration communicated by Lupo Mariategui to Jacinto who testified
that "when (his) father was still living, he was able to mention to (him)
that he and (his) mother were able to get married before a Justice of the Peace
of Taguig, Rizal." The spouses deported themselves as husband and wife,
and were known in the community to be such. Although no marriage certificate
was introduced to this effect, no evidence was likewise offered to controvert
these facts. Moreover, the mere fact that no record of the marriage exists does
not invalidate the marriage, provided all requisites for its validity are
present (People vs. Borromeo, 133 SCRA 106 [1984]).
Under these circumstances, a
marriage may be presumed to have taken place between Lupo and Felipa. The laws
presume that a man and a woman, deporting themselves as husband and wife, have
entered into a lawful contract of marriage; that a child born in lawful
wedlock, there being no divorce, absolute or from bed and board is legitimate;
and that things have happened according to the ordinary course of nature and
the ordinary habits of life.
Courts look upon the presumption of
marriage with great favor as it is founded on the following rationale:
The
basis of human society throughout the civilized world is that of marriage.
Marriage in this jurisdiction is not only a civil contract, but it is a new
relation, an institution in the maintenance of which the public is deeply
interested. Consequently, every intendment of the law leans toward legalizing
matrimony. Persons dwelling together in apparent matrimony are presumed, in the
absence of any counterpresumption or evidence special to that case, to be in
fact married. The reason is that such is the common order of society and if the
parties were not what they thus hold themselves out as being, they would be
living in the constant violation of decency and of law . . . (Adong vs.
Cheong Seng Gee, 43 Phil. 43, 56 [1922] quoted in Alavado vs. City Government
of Tacloban, 139 SCRA 230 [1985]).
So much so that once a man and a
woman have lived as husband and wife and such relationship is not denied nor
contradicted, the presumption of their being married must be admitted as a fact
(Alavado v. City Gov't. of Tacloban, supra).
Proof of Filiation
Under
Title VI of the Family Code, there are only two classes of children —
legitimate and illegitimate. Article 172 of the said Code provides
that the filiation of legitimate children may be established by the record of
birth appearing in the civil register or a final judgment or by the open and
continuous possession of the status of a legitimate child.
Evidence on record proves the
legitimate filiation of the private respondents. Jacinto's birth certificate is a record of birth referred to in
the said article. Again, no evidence which tends to disprove facts contained
therein was adduced before the lower court. In the case of the two other
private respondents, Julian and Paulina, they may not have presented in
evidence any of the documents required by Article 172 but they continuously enjoyed the status of
children of Lupo Mariategui in the same manner as their brother Jacinto.
In view of the foregoing, there can
be no other conclusion than that private respondents are legitimate children
and heirs of Lupo Mariategui and therefore, the time limitation prescribed in
Article 285 for filing an action for recognition is inapplicable to this
case.
Prescription of Action for Partition
Corollarily, prescription does not
run against private respondents with respect to the filing of the action for
partition so long as the heirs for whose benefit prescription is invoked, have not expressly or impliedly
repudiated the co-ownership. In other words, prescription of an action for
partition does not lie except when the co-ownership is properly repudiated by
the co-owner (Del Banco vs.
Intermediate Appellate Court, 156 SCRA 55 [1987] citing Jardin vs. Hollasco,
117 SCRA 532 [1982]).
Otherwise stated, a co-owner cannot acquire by
prescription the share of the other co-owners absent a clear repudiation of
co-ownership duly communicated to the other co-owners (Mariano vs. De Vega, 148 SCRA 342 [1987]).
Furthermore, an action to
demand partition is imprescriptible and cannot be barred by laches (Del Banco vs. IAC, 156 SCRA 55
[1987]). On the other hand, an action for partition may be seen to be at once
an action for declaration of co-ownership and for segregation and conveyance of
a determinate portion of the property involved (Roque vs. IAC, 165 SCRA 118
[1988]).
Repudiation
Petitioners contend that they have
repudiated the co-ownership when they executed the extrajudicial partition
excluding the private respondents and registered the properties in their own
names. However, no valid repudiation was made by petitioners to the prejudice
of private respondents. Assuming petitioners' registration of the subject lot
in 1971 was an act of repudiation of the co-ownership, prescription had not yet
set in when private respondents filed in 1973 the present action for partition
(Ceniza vs. C.A., 181 SCRA 552 [1990]).
In their complaint, private
respondents averred that in spite of their demands, petitioners, except the
unwilling defendants in the lower court, failed and refused to acknowledge and
convey their lawful shares in the estate of their father (Record on Appeal, p.
6). This allegation, though denied by the petitioners in their answer (Ibid, p.
14), was never successfully refuted by them. Put differently, in spite of
petitioners' undisputed knowledge of their relationship to private respondents
who are therefore their co-heirs, petitioners fraudulently withheld private
respondent's share in the estate of Lupo Mariategui. According to respondent
Jacinto, since 1962, he had been inquiring from petitioner Maria del Rosario
about their (respondents) share in the property left by their deceased father
and had been assured by the latter (Maria del Rosario) not to worry because
they will get some shares. As a matter of fact, sometime in 1969, Jacinto
constructed a house where he now resides on Lot No. 163 without any complaint
from petitioners.
Petitioners' registration of the
properties in their names in 1971 did not operate as a valid repudiation of the
co-ownership. In Adille vs. Court of Appeals (157
SCRA 455, 461-462 [1988]), the Court held:
Prescription,
as a mode of terminating a relation of co-ownership, must have been preceded by
repudiation (of the co-ownership). The act of repudiation, in turn, is subject
to certain conditions: (1) a co-owner repudiates the co-ownership; (2) such an
act of repudiation is clearly made known to the other co-owners; (3) the
evidence thereon is clear and conclusive; and (4) he has been in possession
through open, continuous, exclusive, and notorious possession of the property
for the period required by law.
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It
is true that registration under the Torrens system is constructive notice of
title, but it has likewise been our holding that the Torrens title does not
furnish shield for fraud. It is therefore no argument to say that the act of
registration is equivalent to notice of repudiation, assuming there was one,
notwithstanding the long-standing rule that registration operates as a
universal notice of title.
Inasmuch as petitioners registered the properties in their names
in fraud of their co-heirs prescription can only be deemed to have commenced
from the time private respondents discovered the petitioners' act of
defraudation (Adille vs. Court of Appeals, supra). Hence,
prescription definitely may not be invoked by petitioners because private
respondents commenced the instant action barely two months after learning that
petitioners had registered in their names the lots involved. (Maria Del
Rosario Mariategui, et al. vs. Court of Appeals, et al., G.R. No. L-57062 January 24, 1992)
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