Florido v. Shemberg Marketing Corporation
REITERATIONFacts
The Antecedents: Respondent Shemberg Marketing Corporation filed a complaint for collection of a sum of money with a plea for a writ of preliminary attachment against Solomon Nacua, Jr. The trial court granted the writ, and the sheriff prepared to levy on five marine vessels owned by Nacua. The sheriff learned that Nacua had fled the country and appointed his brother, Mariano Florido, Jr., as attorney-in-fact. The sheriff served the summons on Mariano Florido, Jr., in the presence of petitioner Bernardito A. Florido. The sheriff then levied on four of Nacua's vessels moored at the Cabahug Wharf. Procedural History: Petitioner filed a "Third Party Claim," asserting Nacua owed him ₱7,000,000.00 and had pledged the vessels to him through his attorney-in-fact. Petitioner also filed a "Motion to Declare Levy on Attachment Null and Void and for Preliminary Injunction," alleging invalid service of summons and prior seizure of the vessels. He further filed a "Motion to Cancel Bond." The trial court denied these motions, ruling that service of summons was proper and that petitioner lacked the personality to challenge the attachment bond. Petitioner then filed a "Complaint of Third-Party Claimant" which remained pending. Subsequently, petitioner filed a special civil action for certiorari with the Court of Appeals (CA) seeking to nullify the trial court's orders denying his motions. The CA affirmed the trial court's orders, and denied reconsideration. The Petition: Petitioner seeks review of the CA's decision, arguing that the CA erred in upholding the trial court's denial of his motion to annul the levy on attachment and his motion to cancel the bond, and in holding that he could no longer file for damages after questioning the bond's validity.
Issue(s)
Whether petitioner had the personality to challenge the attachment writ and bond. Whether the Court of Appeals erred in upholding the trial court's denial of petitioner's motion to annul the levy on attachment. Whether the Court of Appeals erred in upholding the trial court's denial of petitioner's motion to cancel the bond. Whether the Court of Appeals erred in holding that petitioner may no longer file for damages after questioning the validity of the attachment bond.
Ruling
The petition is denied, and the decision of the Court of Appeals is affirmed.
Ratio Decidendi
On the personality to challenge the attachment writ and bond: The Court held that petitioner did not have the personality to challenge the attachment writ and bond. Section 14, Rule 57 of the 1997 Rules of Civil Procedure provides specific remedies for a third-party claimant, which include filing an affidavit of title or right to possession with the sheriff and serving it upon the sheriff and the attaching party. Instead of submitting such an affidavit, petitioner elected to pursue his claim within the respondent's action against Nacua. The Court emphasized that the veracity of his claim should be threshed out in the "Third-Party Claim" and "Complaint of Third Party Claimant" that he himself filed. The Court reiterated that a stranger to an action where property is attached must resort to the remedies available under the Rules of Court, and the only exception is when the sheriff mistakenly levies on properties not belonging to the judgment debtor, which was not the case here as Nacua's ownership of the vessels was undisputed. On the denial of the motion to annul levy on attachment and the availability of a plain, speedy, and adequate remedy: The Court affirmed the CA's ruling that the trial court did not err in denying petitioner's motion to annul the levy. The Court found that petitioner's resort to a special civil action for certiorari was improper because he had plain, speedy, and adequate remedies in the ordinary course of law. The Court cited Roque v. Court of Appeals and La Tondeña Distillers, Inc. v. Court of Appeals, which established that a third-party claimant should ventilate their claims of ownership in a separate and independent action or through the remedies provided under Section 14, Rule 57 of the Rules of Court. Petitioner's argument that filing an affidavit of claim or a separate action could not promptly relieve him of the consequences of the levy was deemed conjectural and self-serving. The Court stressed that the emergence of third-party claims to protest attachment is not new, and established procedures exist to address them. On the denial of the motion to cancel the bond: The Court affirmed the CA's ruling that the trial court did not err in denying petitioner's motion to cancel the bond. The denial was based on the proper service of summons and the petitioner's lack of personality to challenge the attachment bond, as only the defendant Nacua could do so. The Court found that petitioner's attempt to short-circuit the rules by filing a certiorari petition instead of pursuing the prescribed remedies was erroneous. The Court reiterated that the proper venue for resolving the ownership dispute and the validity of the pledge was the "Complaint of Third-Party Claimant" filed by the petitioner himself. On the right to file for damages: The Court implicitly addressed this by affirming the CA's decision, which upheld the trial court's denial of the petitioner's motions. The reasoning that petitioner lacked the personality to challenge the attachment bond and that he had other adequate remedies meant that his procedural avenues to pursue damages through the questioned motions were correctly dismissed. The Court's emphasis on vindicating his claim through a separate action or the prescribed third-party claim procedure indicates that damages would be addressed in that proper venue, not through the certiorari petition.
Main Doctrine
A third-party claimant whose property has been attached in a suit to which they are not a party must pursue the remedies provided by the Rules of Court, such as filing a third-party claim or a separate vindicatory action, and cannot resort to a special civil action for certiorari to assail the levy unless there is no plain, speedy, and adequate remedy in the ordinary course of law.