G.R. No. 152496 - SPOUSES GERMAN ANUNCIACION AND ANA FERMA ANUNCIACION AND GAVINO G. CONEJOS, VS. PERPETUA M. BOCANEGRA AND GEORGE M. BOCANEGRA. D E C I S I O N - Supreme Court E-Library

Ruling

WHEREFORE, premises considered, on the ground that the Court has no jurisdiction over the persons of the defendants, the case is hereby DISMISSED. The motion for reconsideration filed by the petitioners was denied for lack of merit. Aggrieved, petitioners filed before the CA a Petition for Certiorari, seeking the nullification of the RTC Orders dated February 19, 2001 and May 16, 2001, on the ground that the said orders were issued with grave abuse of discretion. On November 19, 2001, the CA dismissed the petition upon finding that there was no waiver of the ground of lack of jurisdiction on the part of respondents in the form of voluntary appearance. Applying Section 20, Rule 14 of the 1997 Rules of Civil Procedure, the CA held that although the grounds alleged in the two (2) earlier Motion to Dismiss and Supplemental Motion to Dismiss were lack of cause of action and failure to pay the required filing fee, the filing of the said motions did not constitute a waiver of the ground of lack of jurisdiction on their persons as defendants. The CA then concluded that there was no voluntary appearance on the part of respondents/defendants despite the filing of the aforesaid motions. The CA also rejected petitioners' contention that the service made to Atty. Rogelio Pizarro, Jr. was deemed service upon respondents/defendants, thus: First of all, Atty. Rogelio Pizarro cannot be considered as counsel of record wherein We could apply the jurisprudential rule that notice to counsel is notice to client. Atty. Pizarro cannot be deemed counsel on record since Defendants were not the one's ( sic ) who instituted the action, like plaintiffs who did the same thru counsel and therefore, obviously the one who signed the pleadings is the counsel on record. Sadly, the Motion to Dismiss filed by Private Respondents were signed not by Atty. Pizarro but by someone else. How then could Petitioners claim that Atty. Pizarro represents Private Respondents? Secondly, the fact that Atty. Pizarro was the one who wrote and signed the August 19, 2000 letter, on behalf of Private Respondents, demanding that Petitioners vacate the premises of the former's land does not fall under the substituted service rule. To be sure, Section 7 of Rule 14 of the 1997 Rules, provide thus: Sec. 7. Substituted Services - If, for justifiable causes the defendant cannot be served within a reasonable time as provided in the preceding section; service maybe reflected (a) by leaving copies of the summons at the defendants' residence with some person of suitable age and discretion then residing therein or (b) by leaving the copies at defendant (sic) office or regular place of business with some competent person in charge thereof. In the case at bench, service upon Atty. Pizarro did not fall under the aforequoted rule and therefore cannot qualify as substituted service. Since the service made by Petitioners was defective, the Public Respondent court never did acquire jurisdiction over the persons of defen