CIVIL PROCEDURE Appeals Forum Shopping Fresh Period Rule Alma Jose vs. Javellana

 Alma Jose vs. Javellana

Facts: 1979, Alma (Margarita) sold 2 parcels of land for 160k. They agreed that Javellana would pay P80k upon the execution of the deed and the balance of P80k upon the registration of the parcels of land under the Torrens System and that should Margarita become incapacitated, her son Juvenal, and her daughter, petitioner Priscilla, would receive the payment of the balance and proceed with the application for registration.

Margarita died. Priscilla did not comply with the undertaking to register under the Torrens System, and, instead, began to improve the properties.

Javellana filed an action for specific performance, injunction, and damages against her in the RTC Malolos, Bulacan. Javellana prayed for the issuance of a TRO to restrain Priscilla from dumping filling materials in the parcels of land; and that Priscilla be ordered to institute registration proceedings and then to execute a final deed of sale in his favor.

RTC held that Javellana had no cause of action against her due to her not being bound to comply with the terms of the deed of conditional sale for not being party thereto.

The RTC held Javellana guilty of forum shopping. It appears that pending the appeal, Javellana also filed a petition for certiorari in the CA. CA dismissed the petition for certiorari. As to the notice on appeal, the CA reversed and set aside the RTC decision and remanded the records to the RTC.

Issue: WON Javellana was guilty of forum shopping

Held: No. Forum shopping is the act of a party litigant against whom an adverse judgment has been rendered in one forum seeking and possibly getting a favorable opinion in another forum, other than by appeal or the special civil action of certiorari, or the institution of two or more actions or proceedings grounded on the same cause or supposition that one or the other court would make a favorable disposition.

Forum shopping happens when, in the two or more pending cases, there is identity of parties, identity of rights or causes of action, and identity of reliefs sought. Where the elements of litis pendentia are present, and where a final judgment in one case will amount to res judicata in the other, there is forum shopping.

For litis pendentia to be a ground for the dismissal of an action, there must be: (a) identity of the parties or at least such as to represent the same interest in both actions; (b) identity of rights asserted and relief prayed for, the relief being founded on the same acts; and (c) the identity in the two cases should be such that the judgment which may be rendered in one would, regardless of which party is successful, amount to res judicata in the other.

For forum shopping to exist, both actions must involve the same transaction, same essential facts and circumstances and must raise identical causes of action, subject matter and issues. Clearly, it does not exist where different orders were questioned, two distinct causes of action and issues were raised, and two objectives were sought.

In his appeal in C.A.-G.R. CV No. 68259, Javellana aimed to undo the RTC’s erroneous dismissal of Civil Case No. 79-M-97 to clear the way for his judicial demand for specific performance to be tried and determined in due course by the RTC; but his petition for certiorari had the ostensible objective "to prevent (Priscilla) from developing the subject property and from proceeding with the ejectment case until his appeal is finally resolved," as the CA explicitly determined in its decision in C.A.-G.R. SP No. 60455.

Nor were the dangers that the adoption of the judicial policy against forum shopping designed to prevent or to eliminate attendant. The first danger, i.e., the multiplicity of suits upon one and the same cause of action, would not materialize considering that the appeal was a continuity of Civil Case No. 79-M-97, whereas C.A.-G.R. SP No. 60455 dealt with an independent ground of alleged grave abuse of discretion amounting to lack or excess of jurisdiction on the part of the RTC. The second danger, i.e., the unethical malpractice of shopping for a friendly court or judge to ensure a favorable ruling or judgment after not getting it in the appeal, would not arise because the CA had not yet decided C.A.-G.R. CV No. 68259 as of the filing of the petition for certiorari.