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Petitioners Vs Vs Respondents: Third Division
Petitioners Vs Vs Respondents: Third Division
RESOLUTION
NACHURA , J : p
Before us is a petition for review on certiorari under Rule 45 of the Rules of Court
seeking to set aside the Court of Appeals (CA) Resolutions dated January 24, 2001 1
and May 30, 2001 2 in CA-G.R. CV No. 59563. TCaEAD
On June 9, 1988, spouses Engracio and Claudia Bautista (spouses Bautista) led
a Complaint 3 for Reimbursement of Loan Payments and/or Collection of Money with
Damages against petitioners Rogelio Guevarra and Edgardo Bantugan, and spouses
Aguinaldo and Remegia Santos (spouses Santos), before the Regional Trial Court (RTC)
of Olongapo City. The case was ra ed to Branch 73, and was docketed as Civil Case
No. 294-0-88. Petitioners, in turn, led a Third-Party Complaint against Jesus Danao
(Danao) and Cecilia Lacson (Lacson), as the amount borrowed was invested in the
latter's project.
After trial, or on January 5, 1996, the RTC rendered a Decision 4 in favor of the
spouses Bautista and against the petitioners, the dispositive portion of which reads:
WHEREFORE, in view of the foregoing, judgment is hereby rendered in
favor of the plaintiffs and against defendants Rogelio Guevarra and Edgardo
Bantugan.
SO ORDERED. 5
II.
Before ruling on the petition, the Court notes that respondents Lacson and the
spouses Bautista led their respective Comments. For failure to serve the Resolution
requiring respondent Danao to comment on the petition, we have repeatedly ordered
the petitioners to furnish this Court with Danao's correct and present address.
Considering the length of time that lapsed since Danao was rst ordered to comment
on the petition, he is now deemed to have waived his right to file the same.
The petition is without merit.
Relief from judgment is a remedy provided by law to any person against whom a
decision or order is entered through fraud, accident, mistake, or excusable negligence.
1 5 It is a remedy, equitable in character, that is allowed only in exceptional cases when
there is no other available or adequate remedy. When a party has another remedy
available to him, which may either be a motion for new trial or appeal from an adverse
decision of the trial court, and he was not prevented by fraud, accident, mistake, or
excusable negligence from ling such motion or taking such appeal, he cannot avail of
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the remedy of petition for relief. 1 6
Petitioners' counsel received the June 4, 1996 Order denying their motion for
reconsideration. However, he failed to le a notice of appeal because, allegedly, the
receipt of said order was not brought to his attention, as he was then busy preparing to
leave for a conference in Baguio City. 1 7 This, according to the petitioners, is a clear
case of excusable negligence on the part of his counsel, warranting relief from
judgment.
Unfortunately for the petitioners, negligence, to be "excusable", must be such that
ordinary diligence and prudence could not have guarded against it. Their counsel's
oversight can hardly be characterized as excusable, much less unavoidable. It is settled
that clients are bound by the mistakes, negligence and omission of their counsel. While,
exceptionally, the client may be excused from the failure of counsel, the circumstances
obtaining in the present case do not convince this Court to take exception. 1 8
To strengthen their claim for relief from judgment, petitioners relied on their
alleged meritorious defense, thereby focusing mainly on the grounds warranting the
reversal of the January 5, 1996 Decision. We would like to emphasize at this point that
fraud, accident, mistake, or excusable negligence should rst be established before
relief from judgment can be granted. Indeed, relief will not be granted to a party who
seeks avoidance from the effects of the judgment when the loss of the remedy at law
was due to his own (or that of his counsel) negligence; otherwise, the petition for relief
can be used to revive the right to appeal which had been lost through inexcusable
negligence. 1 9 cCaSHA
As held in Insular Life Savings & Trust Co. v. Spouses Runes, 2 0 relief cannot be
granted on the imsy excuse that the failure to appeal was due to the neglect of the
petitioners' counsel. Otherwise, all that a defeated party has to do to salvage his case
would be to claim neglect or mistake on the part of his counsel as a ground for
reversing the adverse judgment, and there would then be no end to litigation, as every
shortcoming of counsel could be the subject of challenge by his client.
To reiterate, as clearly attempted by the petitioners, petition for relief from
judgment cannot be availed of to revive a lost appeal. It must be established that the
decision became nal and executory, or that the judgment or order had been entered,
by reason of fraud, accident, mistake, or excusable negligence. No such circumstance
has been shown to exist in this case.
WHEREFORE, premises considered, the petition is DENIED. The Resolutions of
the Court of Appeals dated January 24, 2001 and May 30, 2001 are AFFIRMED.
SO ORDERED.
Ynares-Santiago, Austria-Martinez, Chico-Nazario and Reyes, JJ., concur.
Footnotes
1. Penned by Associate Justice Elvi John S. Asuncion, with Associate Justices Oswaldo D.
Agcaoili and Mercedes Gozo-Dadole, concurring; rollo, pp. 100-101.
ACEIac
2. Id. at 110-111.
3. Rollo, pp. 28-33.
4. Penned by Judge Alicia L. Santos; id. at 75-81.
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5. Id. at 81.
6. Id. at 53-56.
7. The grounds relied upon in their petition for relief are as follows:
a) That out of the P200,000.00 defendant-petitioner and the other defendants
obtained from plaintiffs, the amount of P131,714.00 was given to third-party defendants
Jesus Danao and Cecilia Lacson . . . .
b) That there are other documents . . . presented by herein petitioner to prove the
liability of third-party defendants which unfortunately [were] not given weight and
probative value by the Honorable Court;
c) That aside from documentary evidence, testimonial evidence were proffered which
are su cient enough to establish the culpability of third-party defendants. It is
noteworthy that third-party defendants never appeared in Court to testify to rebut the
allegations of herein defendant-petitioner which remained uncontested/unrebutted to
date. (Id. at 54.)
8. Id. at 57-59.
9. Id. at 58.
10. Id. at 94-95.
11. Section 1. Grounds for dismissal of appeal. — An appeal may be dismissed by the
Court of Appeals, on its own motion or on that of the appellee, on the following grounds:
IAcDET