G.R. No. 45856; June 27, 1938
MANILA ELECTRIC COMPANY, plaintiff-appellee, vs. RAMON ROCES, defendant-appellant.
FACTS
Manila Electric Company filed a complaint against Ramon Roces to enjoin his use of an underground electric cable. In his answer, Roces claimed that it was not him, but Ramon Roces Publications, Inc., a corporation, that secured the permit for the cable. The plaintiff moved to amend its complaint to substitute the corporation as the defendant in place of Ramon Roces. The trial court granted the amendment over Roces’s opposition. Roces appealed the order allowing the amendment. The trial court, however, refused to approve his bill of exceptions, reasoning that since he had been eliminated as a party defendant by the amendment, he no longer had any interest in the case and thus no right to appeal.
ISSUE
Whether the trial court erred in refusing to approve and give due course to Ramon Roces’s bill of exceptions from the order allowing the amendment of the complaint that substituted him as the defendant.
RULING
Yes, the trial court erred. The Supreme Court ordered the trial court to admit and give due course to the bill of exceptions. The order allowing the amendment was not merely interlocutory as to Ramon Roces; its effect was to completely terminate the case against him. Since Roces appealed that order, it was not yet final. Consequently, he remained a party to the case until the order became final, and he retained the right to appeal from it. The disapproval of his bill of exceptions was therefore erroneous.
AI Generated by Armztrong.
