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VS
LAPANDAY HOLDINGS
FACTS:
ISSUES:
Whether or not Petition for Certiorari under Rule 65 is the proper remedy
II
HELD:
I. Appeal is the proper remedy and not a Petition for Certiorari under Rule
65
Under Rule 41, Rules of Court, an appeal may be taken from a judgment or final
order that completely disposes of the case, or of a particular matter therein when
declared by the Rules of Court to be appealable. Included in the modes of appeal are
ordinary appeal, petition for review, and appeal by certiorari.
FACTOR, J.V.B.
Remedial Law Review I
1
Judge Eleuterio Bathan
A writ of certiorari may be issued only for the correction of errors of jurisdiction or
grave abuse of discretion amounting to lack or excess of jurisdiction. The writ
cannot be used for any other purpose, as its function is limited to keeping the
inferior court within the bounds of its jurisdiction.
Where appeal is available to the aggrieved party, the action for certiorari will not be
entertained. Remedies of appeal and certiorari are mutually exclusive, not alternative
or successive. Hence, certiorari is not and cannot be a substitute for an appeal,
especially if ones own negligence or error in ones choice of remedy occasioned
such loss or lapse. One of the requisites of certiorari is that there can be no available
appeal or any plain, speedy and adequate remedy. Where an appeal is available,
certiorari will not prosper, even if the ground therefor is grave abuse of discretion.
Petitioner was ascribing error of judgment, not jurisdiction, in its Petitioner for
Certiorari filed with the Court of Appeals. The issue there was the trial courts
alleged error in dismissing the complaint for lack of cause of action. As petitioner
was challenging the trial courts interpretation of the law posing a question of law
the issue involved an error of judgment, not of jurisdiction. An error of judgment
committed by a court in the exercise of its legitimate jurisdiction is not necessarily
equivalent to grave abuse of discretion.
The provision is clear. Dismissals on the aforesaid grounds constitute res judicata.
However, such dismissals are still subject to a timely appeal. For those based on
other grounds, the complaint can be refilled. Secion 5, therefore, confirms that an
appeal is the remedy for the dismissal of an action.
Even assuming that the Order of the RTC was erroneous, its error did not constitute
grave abuse of discretion.
As previously stressed, appeal not certiorari was the correct remedy to elevate the
RTCs order granting the Motion to Dismiss. The appeal, which would have involved
a pure question of law, should have been filed with the Supreme Court pursuant ot
Section 2 ( c) of Rule 41 and Section 2 of Rule 50.
FACTOR, J.V.B.
Remedial Law Review I
2
Judge Eleuterio Bathan