Case Digest (G.R. No. 48576)
Facts:
Cayetana Gallardo and Catalino Garcia v. Mariano B. Banzon and Emilio Roque, G.R. No. 48576, September 15, 1943, the Supreme Court, Ozaeta, J., writing for the Court. The plaintiffs-appellants (Gallardo and Garcia) sought to annul a sheriff's execution sale of their land, alleging the underlying judgment had been fully paid and that the notice of sale was not published as required.
The appellants filed the original action in the Court of First Instance of Bataan in September 1938 (Civil Case No. 1641). When the case was called for trial on July 17, 1940, neither the plaintiffs nor their counsel appeared, and the trial court dismissed the action. Counsel for the plaintiffs moved to set aside that dismissal, alleging excusable negligence: he had moved offices, failed to notify the court of his new address, and the trial notice was not delivered to him. The motion was denied by Judge Araneta Diaz, but counsel asserted that the judge verbally instructed him in open court to file a new action instead of prosecuting an appeal from the dismissal.
Relying on that alleged verbal suggestion, counsel filed a new complaint on September 24, 1940, renewing the previous complaint. On motion of the defendants, the court, then presided over by Judge Jose Bernabe, dismissed the new complaint on January 14, 1941, invoking Section 3, Rule 30 of the Rules of Court (failure to prosecute) as amended by the new Rules effective July 1, 1940. The new Rule 30, sec. 3, provides that dismissal for failure to prosecute is an adjudication on the merits unless otherwise provided; Rule 133 contained a transitional clause that the new Rules govern pending cases except where their application "would not be feasible or would work injustice." The appellants argued that, under Rule 38, they were entitled to relief from the first dismissal for accident, mistake, or excusable negligence, and that Judge Araneta Diaz's verbal sugg...(Subscriber-Only)
Issues:
- Under the Rules of Court as amended (particularly Section 3, Rule 30 and Rule 133), should the dismissal of the renewed complaint for failure to prosecute be sustained?
- Ought the order of dismissal be set aside and the case remanded for trial because the appellants were entitled to relief for accident, mistake, or excusable negligence and were induced not to appeal by the tri...(Subscriber-Only)
Ruling:
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Ratio:
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Doctrine:
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