Case Digest (G.R. No. 5075)
Facts:
Mauricio Ramirez, Administrator of the Estate of Moises Ramirez, Deceased v. Simeon Bautista et al., G.R. No. 5075, December 01, 1909, the Supreme Court En Banc, Arellano, C.J., writing for the Court.
The plaintiff and appellee was Mauricio Ramirez, administrator of the estate of Moises Ramirez, who died intestate in February 1900. The defendants and appellants were Simeon Bautista and Raymundo Duran, purchasers of two fish ponds located in Sitio Tagalag, Polo, Bulacan. The action sought to have the sale declared void, to recover possession of the fish ponds and restitution to the estate, and to obtain indemnity for damages.
At his death Moises Ramirez had been twice married. By his first wife, Apolinaria Guillermo, he had five children: Rosa, Carmen, Francisco, Mauricia, and Ignacia. By his second wife, Alejandra Capistrano, he had three children: Cirila, Isabel, and Serapio; of these, only Isabel survived by the time of the litigation (the other two children of the second marriage had died and left their shares to Isabel). The two fish ponds were acquired on March 7, 1895, during the first marriage and thus were treated as conjugal property.
On November 28–29, 1901, the five children of the first marriage sold the two fish ponds to the defendants for P1,100, evidenced by a private and a notarial instrument. The sole surviving child of the second marriage, Isabel, did not join or participate in the sale. When summoned the vendors (the five children who purportedly sold) were cited but did not appear at trial; the purchasers answered and invoked that the vendors be cited as well.
The Court of First Instance of Bulacan found for the plaintiff, holding the fish ponds to pertain to the intestate estate of Moises Ramirez, declared the sale null and void, ordered restitution of possession to the administrator, awarded damages of P200 per annum from notice, and taxed costs against the defendants while reserving the defendants’ recourse against the vendors. The defendants appealed to the Supreme Court. The appeal concerned whether (a) the heirs of both marriages ...(Subscriber-Only)
Issues:
- Did the plaintiff-administrator have the legal capacity to sue?
- Upon the deaths involved, what interests in the two fish ponds accrued to the heirs — i.e., were the children of the first and second marriages co-owners and in what proportions?
- Could the coheirs (the five children of the first marriage) validly alienate their undivided shares without prior partition?
- Was the sale to Bautista and Duran void in its entirety or valid as to thirteen-sixteenths and only void as...(Subscriber-Only)
Ruling:
- (Subscriber-Only)
Ratio:
- (Subscriber-Only)
Doctrine:
- (Subscriber-Only)