G.R. No. 171124 ; February 13, 2008
ALEJANDRO NG WEE, petitioner, vs. MANUEL TANKIANSEE, respondent.

FACTS

Petitioner Alejandro Ng Wee placed substantial funds with Westmont Investment Corporation (Wincorp). He later discovered that Wincorp, allegedly through fraudulent schemes involving its officers and directors, used his funds to extend loans to other corporations without his consent, leaving his investments unsecured. Consequently, Ng Wee filed a civil case for damages and secured a writ of preliminary attachment against the defendants’ properties, including those of respondent Manuel Tankiansee, Wincorp’s Vice-Chairman and Director. The trial court initially denied Tankiansee’s motion to discharge the attachment, a ruling affirmed by the Court of Appeals and subsequently by the Supreme Court in a related petition filed by his co-defendants.
Subsequently, Tankiansee filed a second motion to discharge the attachment, introducing new grounds: his absence from the board meetings that approved the questionable transactions and his status as a fellow victim, having filed cases against Wincorp himself. The trial court denied this motion, ruling these were affirmative defenses pertaining to the merits of the main case. Tankiansee then filed a petition for certiorari with the Court of Appeals, which reversed the trial court and ordered the attachment lifted as to his properties. Ng Wee appealed this decision to the Supreme Court.

ISSUE

Whether the Court of Appeals erred in granting the petition for certiorari and lifting the writ of preliminary attachment against respondent Tankiansee.

RULING

The Supreme Court granted the petition, reversed the Court of Appeals, and reinstated the writ of preliminary attachment against Tankiansee. The legal logic is twofold. First, the Court of Appeals improperly entertained Tankiansee’s certiorari petition. A writ of certiorari under Rule 65 corrects errors of jurisdiction, not errors of judgment. The trial court’s denial of the motion to discharge attachment was an exercise of its discretion, and any alleged error in its appreciation of the facts and evidence constituted an error of judgment, not a jurisdictional flaw. Thus, certiorari was not the proper remedy.
Second, the grounds raised by Tankiansee in his second motion were correctly deemed by the trial court as matters going into the merits of the main case—specifically, his alleged lack of participation and his defenses against the claim of fraud. In proceedings for the discharge of an attachment, the court does not adjudicate the ultimate merits of the case. The hearing is summary in nature, and the court only determines if the grounds for the issuance of the writ under Rule 57 exist based on the applicant’s affidavit and bond. Tankiansee’s new allegations were essentially defenses on the merits, which should be threshed out in a full trial on the main action, not in a summary hearing on the provisional remedy. Therefore, the trial court committed no grave abuse of discretion in denying the motion, and the Court of Appeals erred in overturning that ruling.