De la Paz VS Panis G.R. No.

L-57023 June 22, 1995

Facts;

The case is a petition for certiorari and mandamus for recovery of possession initially
filed by petitioners in the Court of First Instance of Zamabales against private
respondents.

It involves a dispute over a 7.5sq m of land claimed by petitioner as owners over the
strength of TCT-14807 and private respondents as actual possessors. The latter entered
in and established possession over portions of the property for more than 10 years in the
honest belief that it was part of the public domain.

Private respondents did not deny petitioner’s claim over the property. The parties then
limited the questions to be resolved to the following: (a) identify the extent of land
claimed by petitioners, (b) whether or not area occupied by respondents are within the
limits of claimed land, (c) whether or not parties are entitled to damages.

Private respondent filed a petition for certiorari and prohibition with preliminary injunction
in this Court as respondent judge disregarded the aforementioned questions during trial.
The Court then resolved that the only issue between parties is whether or not the land
occupied by private respondents is included in the TCT and thereafter approved a
compromised agreement to conduct a relocation survey, the result of which the
respondent judge and private respondents should comply.

Geodetic Engineer report confirmed that private respondents were occupying portions of
the titled land.

However, respondent judge dismissed the complaint and counterclaims of the both
parties claiming that while complaint was a recovery of possession, it was in reality one
for ejectment or illegal detainer.

Petitioners then filed this case praying for the nullification of the decision and compelling
respondent judge to issue a writ execution enforcing the compromised agreement.

ISSUES:

1. WON the case is that of a plenary action for recovery of possession.

a. WON respondent judge has jurisdiction over the case.

HELD:

Respondent judge dismissed the action on the assumption that it is one for ejectment
cognizable by the MTC. Such supposition is erroneous.

Ejectment may be effected only through an action for forcible entry or unlawful detainer.
Forcible entry is a summary action to recover material or physical possession of real
property when the person who originally held it was deprived of possession by force,
intimidation, threat, strategy, or stealth. An action for unlawful detainer may be filed
when possession by "a landlord, vendor, vendee, or other person against whom the
possession of any land or building is unlawfully withheld after the expiration or
termination of the right to hold possession, by virtue of any contract. Both actions may
be filed with the municipal courts within one year after the unlawful deprivation or
withholding of possession.

Forcible entry was ruled out as there is no allegation in the complaint that petitioners
were denied possession of the land in question through any of the methods stated.
Neither is the action one for unlawful detainer as there is no lease contract between the
parties, and the demand to vacate made upon the private respondents did not make
them tenants of the petitioners.

In order to gain possession of the land occupied by the private respondents, the proper
remedy adopted by the petitioners was the plenary action of recovery of
possession before the then Court of First Instance. Respondent judge, therefore,
had jurisdiction over the case and should not have dismissed it on the ground of lack
thereof.

Respondent judge should have stuck to the aforesaid three issues defined by the parties
during pre-trial and considered the result of the land survey.

In addition, private respondents likewise argue in their comment and memorandum that
since the petitioners "had not yet entered the land in question (at the time of filing of the
complaint), they had not lost any possession, and the civil case they filed for recovery of
possession was wrong as no possession had been lost by them." This argument is
untenable. It amounts to recognition by the private respondents of petitioners' right to
possess the land in question and confirms the absence of any past or present tenancy
relationship between the parties.

The three kinds of actions for the recovery of possession of real property are:

1. Accion interdictal, or an ejectment proceeding which may be either that for forcible
entry (detentacion) or unlawful detainer (desahucio), which is a summary action for
recovery of physical possession where the dispossession has not lasted for more
than one year, and should be brought in the proper inferior court;

2. Accion publiciana or the plenary action for the recovery of the real right of
possession, which should be brought in the proper Regional Trial Court when the
dispossession has lasted for more than one year; and

3. Accion reinvindicatoria or accion de reivindicacion, which is an action for the

recovery of ownership which must be brought in the proper Regional Trial Court.