4. Tupas vs.

Court of Appeals

TITLE FRANCISCO LIM TUPAS and IGNACIO LIM TUPAS, petitioners, vs.
HON. COURT OF APPEALS and PEOPLE OF THE PHILIPPINES,
respondents.

GR NUMBER G.R. No. 89571

DATE February 6, 1991

PONENTE Cruz, J

NATURE/ Late filing of petition for review; Due process of law

KEYWORDS

FACTS On April 3, 1989, Petitioners herein received a copy of the decision

rendered by the Regional Trial Court of Pasay City. Petitioners then filed
a motion for reconsideration on April 17, 1989 or fourteen days later,
however this was denied by the RTC. The Order issued by the RTC on May
3, 1989 containing the denial was received by petitioners’ counsel on May
9, 1989 and instead of filing for petition for review with the Court of
Appeals the following day on May 10, 1989 (last day of the 15 day
reglementary period), the counsel filed on May 23, 1989 making their
petition 14 days late.

Petitioners claim that they were denied the due process of law arguing
that they were prejudiced by the mistakes of their counsel and that as
laymen, they are not familiar with the intricacies of the law.

ISSUE(S) Whether or not petitioners were denied the due process of law

RULING(S) No. The Court did not commit any reversible error in dismissing the
petitioners’ appeal on the ground of tardiness. Sec 22 of BP 129 and
Section 22(b) of the Interim rules, “If a motion for reconsideration is
filed with and denied by a regional trial court, the movant has only
the remaining period within which to file a petition for review.
Hence, it may be necessary to file a motion with the Court of Appeals for
extension of time to file such petition for review”.

Following the above quoted procedure, it is clear that petitioners’ counsel

did not file within the remaining reglementary period or filed an extension
at the very least which would be granted as a matter of course and in
effect forfeited their right to appeal. The Court is of the impression that
they waited to move for reconsideration until the last hour and, ultimately,
when the motion was denied, filed the petition for review only when it was
already too late.

Petitioners contention that the late submission of their counsel is an

“honest error” and that it should be regarded as “excusable neglect” is
without merit considering that the latter is a distinguished trial lawyer who
also served as a bar examiner and a law professor.

NOTE: Read this, very relevant sa topic kung san siya under.

“Rules of procedure are intended to ensure the orderly administration of

justice and the protection of substantive rights in judicial and extrajudicial
proceedings. It is a mistake to suppose that substantive law and adjective
law are contradictory to each other or, as has often been suggested, that
enforcement of procedural rules should never be permitted if it will result
in prejudice to the substantive rights of the litigants. This is not exactly
true; the concept is much misunderstood. As a matter of fact, the policy
of the courts is to give effect to both kinds of law, as complementing each
other, in the just and speedy resolution of the dispute between the
parties. Observance of both substantive and procedural rights is
equally guaranteed by due process, whatever the source of such”