GR 149195; (June, 2006) (Digest)
G.R. No. 149195 , June 26, 2006
LA CAMPANA DEVELOPMENT CORPORATION, Petitioner, vs. LALAINE SEE, et al., Respondents.
FACTS
Petitioner La Campana Development Corporation leased warehouses within its compound to respondents. In 1997, the Development Bank of the Philippines (DBP) informed respondents that, by virtue of final court decisions, it had become the owner of the property, and respondents thereafter paid rent to DBP. Petitioner filed an ejectment suit, and the Metropolitan Trial Court (MeTC) ruled in its favor, ordering respondents to pay back rentals and vacate. Respondents then filed a “manifestation” with the MeTC, alleging extrinsic fraud by petitioner in the lease contracts and praying for rectification of the decision.
Before the MeTC could act, respondents filed a petition for annulment of the MeTC decision with the Regional Trial Court (RTC), reiterating allegations of extrinsic fraud and lack of jurisdiction. The RTC denied petitioner’s motion to dismiss this petition and issued a preliminary injunction. Meanwhile, the MeTC granted petitioner’s motion for a writ of execution, which respondents moved to quash, later withdrawing this motion. Petitioner filed a special civil action for certiorari with the Court of Appeals, challenging the RTC’s denial of its motion to dismiss, but the CA dismissed the petition.
ISSUE
Whether respondents committed forum shopping by filing pleadings in both the MeTC and the RTC, and whether certiorari was the proper remedy to challenge the RTC’s denial of the motion to dismiss.
RULING
Yes, respondents committed forum shopping. Forum shopping exists when there is identity of parties, rights or causes of action, and reliefs prayed for, such that a judgment in one case would amount to res judicata in the other. Here, the parties are identical. The allegations of extrinsic fraud and lack of jurisdiction, and the essential relief sought to nullify the MeTC’s ejectment decision, were the same in both the MeTC manifestation and the RTC petition. This created the risk of conflicting rulings from the two courts, which is the precise evil the prohibition seeks to prevent.
However, the Supreme Court held that petitioner’s resort to a petition for certiorari under Rule 65 was improper. The RTC’s denial of the motion to dismiss was an error of judgment, not an error of jurisdiction or an act done with grave abuse of discretion. A denial of a motion to dismiss is an interlocutory order that cannot be challenged by certiorari; the proper remedy is to file an answer, raise the grounds as affirmative defenses, and await final judgment. Certiorari is reserved for extraordinary circumstances showing a patent disregard of justice, which were not present. Thus, while forum shopping was found, the petition was dismissed due to an incorrect remedy.