Santana-Cruz vs. Court of Appeals

A judgment may be executed by motion within five years from finality and thereafter only by independent action within ten years from finality; an action filed thirteen years after finality is prescribed where non-execution stemmed from plaintiffs' failure to implead indispensable parties. The delay was not chargeable to defendant, who no longer owned the lots to be reconveyed, and the doctrine excusing delay caused by the judgment obligor did not apply.

Ma. Valentina Santana-Cruz serves as administratrix of the intestate estate of Francisco D. Santana, adjudged in Civil Case No. 6482 to reconvey certain Rizal lots to the heirs of Valeriana Marilao. The private respondents claim as those heirs and seek enforcement of the reconveyance judgment against Santana's estate. Understanding the dispute requires the Rule 39 framework governing execution by motion within five years and enforcement by action before prescription, as well as the compulsory joinder of indispensable parties in reconveyance actions.

Francisco D. Santana was among the defendants in Civil Case No. 6482, an action for reconveyance filed by Felipe Riple and others as heirs of Valeriana Marilao over Lots Nos. 2, 4, 6, 11 and 12 of plan Psd-1536-LRC covered by Transfer Certificate of Title No. 65611 of Rizal. On September 30, 1964, the then Court of First Instance of Rizal, Branch X, ordered Santana and the heirs of Catalina Reyes to reconvey the lots to plaintiffs upon payment of P6,233.40, to execute the deed within five days from receipt, and to pay P1,000.00 attorney's fees and costs. The Court of Appeals affirmed in toto on December 5, 1979, and the judgment became final and executory on December 23, 1979.

Thereafter, plaintiffs deposited P5,233.40 under O.R. No. 509010 dated October 29, 1981 as payment of their obligation under the judgment. A writ of execution issued on November 4, 1981 was served by Deputy Sheriff Cristobal S. Jabson on Francisco D. Santana on November 11, 1981, with demand to reconvey within five days. By letter dated November 12, 1981 received the next day, defendants' counsel Atty. Cipriano Azada replied that Santana could not execute the deed because the lots were no longer registered in his name, having been sold even before the complaint was filed, a fact already pleaded in his answer; plaintiffs, he stated, should have amended to include the buyers but did not, and any reconveyance by Santana would be useless.

More than thirteen years after finality, on March 23, 1993, Patrocinia Juanson-Cuizon as attorney-in-fact for the Riple, Marilao, Poblete and Tolentino heirs filed a Complaint for Revival/Execution of Judgment After Lapse of Five Years against petitioner Ma. Valentina Santana-Cruz as administratrix and Ma. Paz S. Concepcion with the RTC, Branch 74, Antipolo. Petitioner moved to dismiss for failure to state a cause of action, prescription, and unauthorized practice, but the trial court denied dismissal, issued an alias writ on September 1, 1993, denied quashal on October 21, 1993, and ordered the Register of Deeds of Marikina to cancel TCT No. 65611 and resultant titles and issue new titles to plaintiffs. The record showed plaintiffs knew even at pre-trial that the lots had been sold to third parties who were never impleaded.

• Loss of Jurisdiction Upon Elevation to the Supreme Court: Petitioner argued that when private respondents through Atty. Mora filed a motion for extension of time to file a petition for review, they perfected their appeal, causing the Court of Appeals to lose jurisdiction to amend, alter or modify its October 12, 1994 Decision and December 15, 1994 Resolution, rendering the February 9, 1995 and April 21, 1995 Resolutions issued without jurisdiction.
• Abandonment Under Internal Rules: Petitioner maintained that under Section 8, Rule 9 of the Revised Internal Rules of the Court of Appeals, no motion for reconsideration shall be acted upon if the movant already filed an appeal by certiorari or motion for extension, and any pending reconsideration is deemed abandoned once such petition is filed.
• Prescription and Correctness of Original Dismissal: Petitioner prayed that the February 9, 1995 and April 21, 1995 Resolutions be annulled and the October 12, 1994 Decision and December 15, 1994 Resolution declared correct, in effect asserting that the revival/execution action filed thirteen years after finality had prescribed and delay was not caused by petitioner.

• Jurisdiction After Resort to the Supreme Court: Whether the Court of Appeals retained jurisdiction to issue the February 9, 1995 and April 21, 1995 Resolutions after private respondents filed motions for extension of time to file petitions for review with the Supreme Court.
• Validity of Counsel and Pending Reconsideration: Whether the reconsideration acted upon was validly filed by the counsel of record absent a valid substitution, and whether it was deemed abandoned by the filing for extension.
• Prescription of Revival/Execution: Whether the complaint for revival/execution of judgment, filed thirteen years after finality and treated as a motion for alias execution, had prescribed where the judgment ordered reconveyance of lots already sold to unimpleaded third parties.

• Jurisdiction After Resort to the Supreme Court: Yes, jurisdiction was retained. No appeal was perfected because the only authorized reconsideration remained pending before the appellate court and the extension filing in G.R. No. 118360 was withdrawn after clarification.
• Validity of Counsel and Pending Reconsideration: The Mora motion was the valid pending motion. Absent compliance with requisites for substitution, Atty. Raul A. Mora remained counsel of record, while the Yap motion was a mere scrap of paper with its related resolutions null and void.
• Prescription of Revival/Execution: Yes, prescribed. Execution by motion lapsed after five years and enforcement by action after ten years from finality, with no excusable delay attributable to petitioner to toll the period.

• Jurisdiction After Resort to the Supreme Court: The two reconsideration filings were disentangled by identifying the true counsel of record. Because Atty. Mora's October 29, 1994 motion, received November 15, 1994, was seasonably filed and remained unresolved due to inadvertent late sewing into the rollo, clarification that the December 15, 1994 denial concerned only Atty. Yap's motion left Mora's motion pending. Upon that clarification Mora withdrew G.R. No. 118360, while G.R. No. 118341 filed by the unauthorized counsel was a nullity, so no perfected appeal divested the appellate court of jurisdiction when it ruled on February 9 and April 21, 1995.
• Validity of Counsel and Pending Reconsideration: Substitution requires (1) written request, (2) written client consent, (3) written consent of counsel to be substituted, or proof of service if such consent is unobtainable, a rule intended to ensure orderly disposition. No such compliance appeared; Mora affirmed he was never dismissed, petitioner treated Mora as counsel of record, and no showing established that all heirs revoked attorney-in-fact Cuizon's authority. Accordingly, only Mora's motion merited action, and the resolutions on Yap's unauthorized motion dated December 15 and December 22, 1994 were declared null and void.
• Prescription of Revival/Execution: A judgment is executable by motion within five years from entry or finality and thereafter by independent action before limitation bars it, with a ten-year prescriptive period from finality and a sixty-day writ lifetime. Filed thirteen years after December 23, 1979 finality, the 1993 complaint, treated as an alias-writ motion, fell outside both periods. Reliance on National Power Corporation vs. Court of Appeals was misplaced because there the obligor caused delay in paying a garnishment balance, whereas here plaintiffs knew from pre-trial that the lots had been sold and failed to join the vendees as indispensable parties, leaving defendant unable to reconvey and without power to bring buyers in absent a cause against them.

• Execution of judgment; five-year motion and ten-year action periods — A judgment may be executed on motion within five years from entry or finality, and thereafter, before being barred by limitation, by independent civil action, whose prescriptive period is ten years from finality while a writ's lifetime is sixty days after receipt by the levying officer. Applied to bar the 1993 revival, filed thirteen years after the 1979 finality, whether viewed as motion for alias writ or independent action.
• Tolling for delay caused by judgment obligor — Delay not attributable to the judgment creditor but to the obligor's own obstruction is excluded from computing the five-year execution period, as in National Power Corporation vs. Court of Appeals where petitioner delayed paying a garnishment balance. Distinguished and held inapplicable because non-execution resulted from creditors' failure to implead vendees, not from petitioner's conduct.
• Indispensable parties in reconveyance — Owners of property over which reconveyance is asserted are indispensable parties without whom no relief is available and no valid judgment can be rendered, with compulsory joinder under Section 7, Rule 3, and a non-party cannot be bound. Applied to hold plaintiffs at fault for knowing of prior sales yet omitting vendees, rendering the reconveyance judgment unenforceable against them and delay unchargeable to petitioner.
• Substitution of counsel — No substitution is allowed unless (1) written request for substitution, (2) written consent of client, (3) written consent of counsel to be substituted, or (4) if such consent is unobtainable, proof of notice and service under the Rules, ensuring orderly proceedings. Applied to retain Atty. Raul A. Mora as counsel of record and treat Atty. Julian S. Yap's appearance and motion as unauthorized and a mere scrap of paper.

• "WHEREFORE, the Amended Decision of the Court of Appeals dated February 9, 1995 is hereby SET ASIDE, and its Decision dated October 12, 1994 is REINSTATED." — States the final dispositive reversal restoring dismissal of the revival complaint on prescription.
• "Owners of property over which reconveyance is asserted are indispensable parties, without whom no relief is available and without whom the court can render no valid judgment." — Defines the controlling indispensable-party rule that placed responsibility for non-execution on plaintiffs who omitted known vendees.
• "No motion for reconsideration or rehearing shall be acted upon if the movant has already filed in the Supreme Court an appeal by certiorari or a motion for extension of time to file such petition." — Quotes the invoked Section 8, Rule 9 bar whose application turned on whether a valid appeal had been perfected.
• "We cannot ignore the motion for reconsideration filed by Atty. Raul A. Mora regardless of the allegation that the authority of Patrocinia Juanson-Cuison to represent the surviving private respondents and the heirs of the deceased private respondents had been revoked." — Explains why the appellate court treated Mora's motion as pending, a premise later refined by the finding that Mora remained counsel of record.

• National Power Corporation vs. Court of Appeals, 213 SCRA 133 (1992) — Cited by the Court of Appeals as basis to exclude delay from the execution period; distinguished and held inapplicable because delay there was caused by the obligor, unlike the creditors' omission here.
• Lozano vs. Ballesteros, 195 SCRA 681 (1991) — Cited for the indispensable-party rule in reconveyance, supporting the conclusion that vendees had to be joined for a valid enforceable judgment.
• Sublay vs. NLRC, G.R. No. 130104, January 31, 2000; Bernardo vs. Court of Appeals, 275 SCRA 413 (1997) — Cited on counsel of record presumption and improper substitution by mere appearance of new counsel.
• Nacuray vs. NLRC, 270 SCRA 9 (1997); Sumadchat vs. Court of Appeals, 111 SCRA 488 (1982) — Cited for the essential requisites of valid substitution of counsel and orderly disposition policy.
• Nery vs. Leyson, et al., G.R. No. 139306, August 29, 2000 — Cited on the duty to implead indispensable parties under Section 7, Rule 3.
• Heirs of Antonio Pael vs. Court of Appeals, et al., G.R. Nos. 133547 & 133843, February 10, 2000 — Cited for the principle that a non-party cannot be bound by a judgment.

• Section 6, Rule 39, Revised Rules of Court — Governs execution by motion within five years from entry or finality and enforcement thereafter by independent action; applied to measure prescription from December 23, 1979 finality against the 1993 filing.
• Section 7, Rule 3, Revised Rules of Court — Requires compulsory joinder of indispensable parties for final determination; applied to fault plaintiffs for omitting known third-party buyers in the reconveyance suit.
• Section 8, Rule 9, Revised Internal Rules of the Court of Appeals — Bars action on reconsideration once movant files Supreme Court certiorari appeal or extension motion, deeming pending reconsideration abandoned; invoked by petitioner but held inapplicable because no authorized appeal had been perfected.

Bellosillo, J., Mendoza, J., and Buena, J., concur. Quisumbing, J., on official business.