Professional Documents
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Adille Vs CA
Adille Vs CA
SUPREME COURT
Manila
SECOND DIVISION
G.R. No. L-44546 January 29, 1988
RUSTICO ADILLE, petitioner,
vs.
THE HONORABLE COURT OF APPEALS, EMETERIA
ASEJO, TEODORICA ASEJO, DOMINGO ASEJO,
JOSEFA ASEJO and SANTIAGO ASEJO, respondents.
SARMIENTO, J.:
In issue herein are property and property rights, a familiar
subject of controversy and a wellspring of enormous
conflict that has led not only to protracted legal
entanglements but to even more bitter consequences, like
strained relationships and even the forfeiture of lives. It is
a question that likewise reflects a tragic commentary on
prevailing social and cultural values and institutions,
where, as one observer notes, wealth and its
accumulation are the basis of self-fulfillment and where
property is held as sacred as life itself. "It is in the
defense of his property," says this modern thinker, that
one "will mobilize his deepest protective devices, and
anybody that threatens his possessions will arouse his
most passionate enmity." 1
The task of this Court, however, is not to judge the
wisdom of values; the burden of reconstructing the social
order is shouldered by the political leadership-and the
people themselves.
The parties have come to this Court for relief and
accordingly, our responsibility is to give them that relief
pursuant to the decree of law.
The antecedent facts are quoted from the
decision 2 appealed from:
xxx xxx xxx
... [T]he land in question Lot 14694 of
Cadastral Survey of Albay located in
Legaspi City with an area of some
11,325 sq. m. originally belonged to one
Felisa Alzul as her own private property;
she married twice in her lifetime; the
first, with one Bernabe Adille, with whom
she had as an only child, herein
defendant Rustico Adille; in her second
marriage with one Procopio Asejo, her
children were herein plaintiffs, now,
sometime in 1939, said Felisa sold the
property in pacto de retro to certain 3rd