GR 43701; (March, 1937) (Digest)
G.R. No. 43701 ; March 6, 1937
In re Intestate of the deceased Marciana Escaño. ANGELITA JONES, petitioner-appellant-appellee, vs. FELIX HORTIGUELA, as administrator, widower and heir, oppositor-appellant-appellee.
FACTS
Marciana Escaño died intestate. Her widower, Felix Hortiguela, was appointed judicial administrator. The court declared Angelita Jones (Escaño’s daughter from her first marriage) and Hortiguela as the only heirs. The court approved Hortiguela’s administrator’s fees of P10,000, his final account, and a project of partition. Later, Angelita Jones, then already of age, filed a motion to reopen the proceedings. She contended that the marriage between her mother and Hortiguela was null and void, and that even if valid, Hortiguela was not entitled to a widower’s usufruct. She also challenged the reasonableness of the administrator’s fees and alleged irregularities in the proceedings. The trial court issued an order that, among other things, set aside the orders approving the fees and the partition, and ordered a new project of partition. Both parties appealed.
ISSUE
The principal issue is the validity of the marriage between Marciana Escaño and Felix Hortiguela. Other issues involve the propriety of the administrator’s fees, the court’s jurisdiction to set aside its final orders, and the classification of the estate properties.
RULING
The Supreme Court held that the marriage between Marciana Escaño and Felix Hortiguela was valid. For purposes of remarriage under the civil marriage law (General Orders No. 68), the seven-year absence of a former spouse is counted from the last known fact of his existence, not from a judicial declaration of absence. Arthur W. Jones (the first husband) had been absent since January 10, 1918. His marriage to Escaño in May 1927 occurred after more than nine years of absence, making it valid. The failure to record the marriage in the civil register did not affect its validity. On the administrator’s fees, the Court found the P10,000 reasonable, with P8,000 as proper compensation for legal services rendered for the estate’s benefit and P2,000 as adequate compensation for Hortiguela’s services as administrator. Finally, the trial court had lost jurisdiction to set aside its final orders (approving the fees and the partition) as no appeal was taken from them, and the grounds invoked did not fall under the provisions allowing reopening (Secs. 113 and 598, Code of Civil Procedure). The Court reversed the portions of the appealed order that set aside the orders on fees and partition and that required a new partition. It affirmed the declaration of heirs and the reservation of the issue on which properties were paraphernal or conjugal.
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