unlawful detainer

An action for unlawful detainer is filed by a person from whom possession of any land or building is unlawfully withheld by another after the expiration or termination of the latter’s right to hold possession under a contract, express or implied

In Co Tiamco v. Diaz, the Court emphasized that “the principle underlying the brevity and simplicity of pleadings in forcible entry and unlawful detainer cases rests upon considerations of public policy.  Ejectment cases are summary in nature for they involve perturbation of social order which must be restored as promptly as possible and, accordingly, technicalities or details of procedure should be carefully avoided.”

  There are two (2) kinds of unlawful detainer:  (1) that filed against a tenant, and (2) that against a vendee or vendor, or other person unlawfully withholding possession of any land or building after the expiration or termination of the right to hold possession by virtue of any contract, express or implied; Section 1, Rule 70, Rules of Court.

The factual mould of the case at bar is different.  The mortgagee (predecessor-in-interest of private respondents) was able to consolidate his ownership over the foreclosed land, cause the cancellation of title in the name of petitioner-mortgagor and the issuance of a new title in his own name.  It was this title that he passed on to his daughters, private respondents herein.  As aforestated, a restraining order was issued by the RTC where the case for annulment of foreclosure sale is pending after the mortgagee had consolidated his ownership over the land, hence, private respondents were left with no choice but to file a separate and independent action for unlawful detainer to recover physical possession of the property.  Unlike in the Joven case, private respondents did not take the law into their own hands and entered the property without the benefit of a court order.  They sought the aid of the court precisely to settle the issue of physical possession or possession de facto of the land when they filed the ejectment case with the MTC.

We find that private respondents have adequately proved that they are entitled to possess the subject land as the registered owners thereof.  The age-old rule is that the person who has a torrens title over a land is entitled to possession thereof. Except for the bare claim that the title of private respondents was obtained in bad faith, petitioner has pointed to no right to justify his continued possession of the subject property.

Be that as it may, we reiterate the rule that the award of possession de facto over the subject land to private respondents would not constitute res judicata as to the issue of ownership thereof, which issue is still being litigated before the RTC of Iloilo City where the case for annulment of mortgages and foreclosure proceedings is pending.

In an action for unlawful detainer, the question of possession is primordial while the issue of ownership is generally unessential.

Section 1, Rule 70 of the Rules of Court, provides:

SECTION 1. Who may institute proceedings, and when. – Subject to the provisions of the next succeeding section, a person deprived of the possession of any land or building by force, intimidation, threat, strategy, or stealth, or a lessor, vendor, vendee, or other person against whom the possession of any land or building is unlawfully withheld after the expiration or termination of the right to hold possession, by virtue of any contract, express or implied, or the legal representatives or assigns of any such lessor, vendor, vendee or other person, may, at any time within one (1) year after such unlawful deprivation or withholding of possession, bring an action in the proper Municipal Trial Court against the person or persons unlawfully withholding or depriving of possession, or any person or persons claiming under them, for the restitution of such possession, together with damages and costs.

WHEREFORE, the instant petition for review on certiorari is hereby DENIED and the questioned Decision of the Court of Appeals AFFIRMED without prejudice to the filing by either party of an action regarding the ownership of the property involved. The temporary restraining order issued on October 13, 1997 is hereby made permanent.  Petitioners and their agents are directed to turn over possession of the property to private respondent.

in unlawful detainer, possession is originally lawful but becomes illegal by reason of the termination of his right of possession under his contract with the plaintiff.

          In marked contrast, unlawful detainer is attended by the following features: (1) prior possession of the property by the plaintiff is not necessary; (2) possession of the property by the defendant at the start is legal but the possession becomes illegal by reason of the termination of his right to possession based on his or her contract or other arrangement with the plaintiff; (3) the plaintiff is required by law to make a demand as a jurisdictional requirement; and (4) the one-year period to bring the complaint is counted from the date of the plaintiff’s last demand on the defendant.

As an action for unlawful detainer, the one-year prescription period started running after August 31, 1998 – the date of receipt of the respondents’ demand letter.  The period ran for almost two months until it was interrupted on October 20, 1998 when the respondents filed their ejectment complaint.  This complaint, however, was dismissed on December 8, 1999.  Upon this dismissal, the prescriptive period again began to run for about four  months when another interruption intervened – the revival of the complaint on April 5, 2000.  Evidently, under these undisputed facts, the period when the prescriptive period effectively ran does not add up to the one-year prescriptive period that would jurisdictionally bar the ejectment case.  

The issue in an unlawful detainer case is limited to physical possession. When a claim of ownership is used as a basis for de facto possession or to assert a better possessory right, the court hearing the case may provisionally rule on the issue of ownership.  As a rule, however, a pending civil action involving ownership of the same property does not justify the suspension of the ejectment proceedings. Only in rare cases has this Court allowed a suspension of the ejectment proceedings and one of these is in the case of Amagan v. Marayag that the petitioners cite.  To quote from Amagan  –

[i]ndisputably, the execution of the MCTC Decision would have resulted in the demolition of the house subject of the ejectment suit; thus, by parity of reasoning, considerations of equity require suspension of the ejectment proceedings. xxx [L]ike Vda. de Legaspi, the respondent’s suit is one of unlawful detainer and not of forcible entry, and most certainly, the ejectment of petitioners would mean a demolition of their house, a matter that is likely to create “confusion, disturbance, inconvenience and expenses” mentioned in the said exceptional case.

Necessarily, the affirmance of the MCTC Decision would cause the respondent to go through the whole gamut of enforcing it by physically removing the petitioners from the premises they claim to have been occupying since 1937. (Respondent is claiming ownership only of the land, not of the house) Needlessly, the litigants as well as the courts will be wasting much time and effort by proceeding at a stage wherein the outcome is at best temporary, but the result of enforcement is permanent, unjust and probably irreparable.

          The facts upon which an action for unlawful detainer can be brought are specially mentioned in Section 1, Rule 70 of the Revised Rules of Court, which provides: 

Section 1. Who may institute proceedings, and when. – Subject to the provisions of the next succeeding section, a person deprived of the possession of any land or building by force, intimidation, threat, strategy, or stealth, or a lessor, vendor, vendee, or other person against whom the possession of any land or building is unlawfully withheld after the expiration or termination of the right to hold possession, by virtue of any contract, express or implied, or the legal representatives or assigns of any such lessor, vendor, vendee or other person may, at any time within one (1) year after such unlawful deprivation or withholding of possession, bring an action in the proper Municipal Trial Court against the person or persons unlawfully withholding or depriving of possession, or any person or persons claiming under them, for the restitution of such possession, together with damages and costs.  (Emphasis supplied)

In unlawful detainer, the possession was originally lawful but became unlawful by the expiration or termination of the right to possess; hence, the issue of rightful possession is decisive for, in such action, the defendant is in actual possession and the plaintiff’s cause of action is the termination of the defendant’s right to continue in possession.

          Applied to the present case, petitioner, as vendor, must comply with two requisites for the purpose of bringing an ejectment suit: (a) there must be failure to pay the installment due or comply with the conditions of the Contract to Sell; and (b) there must be demand both to pay or to comply and vacate within the periods specified in Section 2 of Rule 70, namely: 15 days in case of land and 5 days in case of buildings.  The first requisite refers to the existence of the cause of action for unlawful detainer, while the second refers to the jurisdiction requirement of demand in order that said cause of action may be pursued. 

CONCEPCION V. AMAGAN, JOSEFINA V. AMAGAN and DINA V. AMAGAN, petitioners, vs. TEODORICO T. MARAYAG, respondent.THIRD DIVISION[G.R. No. 138377. February 28, 2000]