G.R. No. 184348 - TAN PO CHU, VS. COURT OF APPEALS, FELIX T. CHINGKOE, ROSITA L. CHINGKOE, AND RODRIGO GARCIA.DECISION - Supreme Court E-Library

Ruling

Accordingly, outright dismissal of Tan's petition is within the jurisdiction of the CA and its correctness may be reviewed through an appeal by certiorari under Rule 45. Certiorari is an extraordinary remedy of last resort for when another remedy is present, certiorari is not available. [18] It is a limited form of review confined to errors of jurisdiction. An error of jurisdiction is one where the officer or tribunal acted without or in excess of its jurisdiction, or with grave abuse of discretion amounting to lack or excess of jurisdiction. [19] On the other hand, an error of judgment is one which the court may commit in the exercise of its jurisdiction. [20] They only involve errors in the court or tribunal's appreciation of the facts and of the law. [21] Errors of jurisdiction are reviewable on certiorari ; errors of judgment, only by appeal. [22] Ordinarily, this Court would have dismissed the petition outright for being an improper remedy. As a general rule, certiorari will not lie as a substitute for an appeal. However, an exception to this rule is where public welfare and the advancement of public policy so dictates. [23] This Court cannot ignore the implications if the petitioner's allegations - that she has the original owner's duplicate TCT of the subject lot and that the SEC revoked FiberTech's registration in 2003 - are true. There will currently exist two owner's duplicate TCTs over the same property possessed by two contending factions in an intra-corporate dispute of a defunct corporation . This anomalous situation can potentially bring considerable hann to the general public and to the integrity of our Torrens system. This Court, therefore, cannot simply leave the parties as they were. The CA committed a grave error when it brushed aside Tan's argument that the RTC rendered its decision without jurisdiction. It ruled that the replacement of a lost duplicate certificate is a proceeding in rem , directed against the whole world; therefore, the RTC acquired jurisdiction when it complied with the notice and hearing requirements under Section 109ofP.D. 1529. The CA completely missed the point because Tan did not assail the RTC's jurisdiction by alleging noncompliance with the requirements of notice and hearing; she questioned the RTC's jurisdiction over the res by claiming that the allegedly lost owner's duplicate was, in fact, not lost but was in her custody. Therefore, the RTC's compliance with Section 109 of P.D. 1529 was irrelevant. We have consistently held that when the owner's duplicate certificate of title has not been lost, but is in fact in the possession of another person, then the reconstituted certificate is void because the court failed to acquire jurisdiction over the subject matter - the allegedly lost owner's duplicate. [24] The correct remedy for the registered owner against an uncooperative possessor is to compel the surrender of the owner's duplicate title through an action for replevin. A judgment void for want of