ACAMPADO V. SPS.

COSMILLA
G.R. No. 198531, September 25, 2015
JARDELEZA, J.

FACTS:

The present petition stems from the Petition for the Declaration of the Nullity of Document filed by
respondents against petitioners before the RTC of Kalibo, Aklan, Branch 6. In their Amended Complaint6
docketed as SPL. Civil Case No. 6644, respondents Spouses Cosmilla alleged that the sale of their share
on the subject property was effected thru a forged Special Power of Attorney (SPA) and is therefore null
and void. After trial on the merits, the RTC rendered a Decision dated 31 March 2005 dismissing the
complaint of the respondents for failure to prove by preponderance of evidence that the signatures of the
respondents in the SPA were forged.

Aggrieved, respondents filed a Motion for Reconsideration10 on 6 May 2005 seeking for the reversal of
the earlier RTC Decision. For failure of the respondents, however, to comply with the requirement of
notice of hearing as required under Sections 4 and 5 of Rule 15 of the Revised Rules of Court, the court a
quo denied the Motion for Reconsideration.

Ascribing grave abuse of discretion, respondents elevated the matter to the Court of Appeals by filing a
Petition for Certiorari, Prohibition and Mandamus12 with prayer for Preliminary Injunction and TRO
seeking to annul and set aside the RTC Order dated 16 May 2005. For lack of merit, the Court of Appeals
dismissed the petition filed by the respondents.

On Motion for Reconsideration by Respondents, however, the Court of Appeals reversed its earlier
Resolution and allowed the relaxation of the procedural in a Resolution16 dated 28 June 2007. Hence, the
appellate court vacated the 16 May 2005 Order of the RTC directed the court a quo to thresh out the
Motion for Reconsideration filed by the respondents on the merits.

In a Resolution17 dated 19 August 2011, the Court of Appeals denied the Motion for Reconsideration
filed by petitioners.

ISSUE:

Whether or not the respondents have complied with the requirement of notice of hearing as required
under Sections 4 and 5 of Rule 15 of the Revised Rules of Court.

RULING:

PETITIONERS. Rule 15 Secs 4-6 The foregoing requirements — that the notice shall be directed to the
parties concerned, and shall state the time and place for the hearing of the motion — are mandatory, and
if not religiously complied with, the motion becomes pro forma. A motion that does not comply with the
requirements of Sections 4 and 5 of Rule 15 of the Rules of Court is a worthless piece of paper which the
clerk of court has no right to receive and which the court has no authority to act upon.21 The logic for
such requirement is simple: a motion invariably contains a prayer which the movant makes to the court
which is usually in the interest of the adverse party to oppose.
The notice of hearing to the adverse party is therefore a form of due process; it gives the other party the
opportunity to properly vent his opposition to the prayer of the movant. In keeping with the principles of
due process, therefore, a motion which does not afford the adverse party a chance to oppose should
simply be disregarded.24 Principles of natural justice demand that a right of a party should not be affected
without giving it an opportunity to be heard. Nevertheless, the three-day requirement is not a hard and fast
rule.31 Where a party has been given an opportunity to be heard, the time to study the motion and oppose
it, there is compliance with the rule.32 The test is the presence of the opportunity to be heard, as well as to
have time to study the motion and meaningfully oppose or controvert the grounds upon which it is based.
Considering that the running of the period towards the finality of the judgment was not stopped, the RTC
Decision dated 31 March 2005 became final and executory. Every litigation must come to an end once a
judgment becomes final, executory and unappealable.

It is important, however, to note that these doctrines refer exclusively to a motion, since a motion
invariably contains a prayer, which the movant makes to the court, which is to repeat usually in the
interest of the adverse party to oppose and in the observance of due process, the other party must be given
the opportunity to oppose the motion.[27] In keeping with the principles of due process, therefore, a
motion which does not afford the adverse party the chance to oppose it should simply be
disregarded.[28] Failure to comply with the required notice and hearing is a fatal defect that is
deleterious to respondents cause.[29]

In New Japan Motors, Inc. v. Perucho,[30] the Court dismissed the motion for reconsideration that was
unaccompanied by a notice of hearing as a piece of paper unworthy of judicial cognizance:

"Under Sections 4 and 5 of Rule 15 of the Rules of Court, x x x a motion is required to be accompanied
by a notice of hearing which must be served by the applicant on all parties concerned at least three (3)
days before the hearing thereof. Section 6 of the same rule commands that '(n)o motion shall be acted
upon by the Court, without proof of service of the notice thereof x x x.' It is therefore patent that the
motion for reconsideration in question is fatally defective for it did not contain any notice of
hearing. We have already consistently held in a number of cases that the requirements of Sections
4, 5 and 6 of Rule 15 of the Rules of Court are mandatory and that failure to comply with the same
is fatal to movant's cause." (Emphasis supplied)

DECISION: WHEREFORE, premises considered, the Decision of the Court of Appeals dated May 23,
2006 and Resolution dated June 19, 2007 in the consolidated cases CA-G.R. SP No. 83938 and CA-G.R.
SP No. 84281 are AFFIRMED, with MODIFICATION as to the award of backwages. Petitioner
Continental Micronesia, Inc. is hereby ordered to pay Respondent Joseph Basso's heirs: 1) separation pay
equivalent to one (1) month pay for every year of service, and 2) full backwages from January 31, 1996,
the date of his illegal dismissal, to October 2, 2002, the date of his compulsory retirement age.

Laude v. Judge Ginez-Jabalde, et al.

G.R. No. 217456, 24 November 2015.
LEONEN, J
FACTS: This involves the celebrated case of Jeffrey “Jennifer” Laude (Jennifer) killed at the Celzone
Lodge on Ramon Magsaysay Drive in Olongapo City allegedly by 19-year-old US Marine L/CPL Joseph
Scott Pemberton (Pemberton). A Complaint for murder was filed by Jennifer’s sibling, Marilou S. Laude,
against Pemberton before the Office of the City Prosecutor which Information was later filed with the
RTC in Olongapo City.

On 19 December 2014, Pemberton surrendered personally to the RTC Judge and was later arraigned. On
the same day of Arraignment petitioner Laude filed an Urgent Motion to Compel the Armed Forces of the
Philippines to Surrender the Custody of Accused to the Olongapo City Jail and a Motion to Allow Media
Coverage. The motion was scheduled on 22 December 2014, 2PM. According to petitioners, they were
only able to serve the Motion on Pemberton’s counsel through registered mail. In any case, they claim to
have also “furnished a copy of the [M]otion personally … at the hearing of the [M]otion. On 23
December 2014, the Urgent Motion was denied, as well as its motion for reconsideration.

ISSUE: Are the averments of the petitioner, that the 3-day notice rule should be should be liberally
applied due to the timing of the arrest and arraignment, tenable?

HELD: NO. Rule 15, Section 4 of the Rules of Court clearly makes it a mandatory rule that the adverse
party be given notice of hearing on the motion at least three days prior. Failure to comply with this notice
requirement renders the motion defective consistent with protecting the adverse party’s right to
procedural due process.

While the general rule is that a motion that fails to comply with the requirements of Rule 15 is a mere
scrap of paper, an exception may be made and the motion may still be acted upon by the court, provided
doing so will neither cause prejudice to the other party nor violate his or her due process rights. The
adverse party must be given time to study the motion in order to enable him or her to prepare properly and
engage the arguments of the movant. In this case, the general rule must apply because Pemberton was not
given sufficient time to study petitioners’ Motion, thereby depriving him of his right to procedural due
process.

Petitioners admit that they personally furnished Pemberton a copy of the Urgent Motion to Compel the
Armed Forces of the Philippines to Surrender Custody of Accused to the Olongapo City Jail only during
the hearing. They attempt to elude the consequences of this belated notice by arguing that they also served
a copy of the Motion by registered mail on Pemberton’s counsel. They also attempt to underscore the
urgency of the Motion by making a reference to the Christmas season and the “series of legal holidays”
where courts would be closed. To compound their obfuscation, petitioners claim that the hearing held on
December 22, 2014, attended by Pemberton’s counsel sufficiently satisfied the rationale of the three-day
notice rule. These circumstances taken together do not cure the Motion’s deficiencies. Even granting that
Pemberton’s counsel was able to comment on the motion orally during the hearing, which incidentally
was set for another incident, it cannot be said that Pemberton was able to study and prepare for his
counterarguments to the issues raised in the Motion. Judge Ginez-J abalde was correct to deny the Urgent
Motion to Compel the Armed Forces of the Philippines to Surrender Custody of Accused to the Olongapo
City Jail based on noncompliance of procedural rules. To rule otherwise would be to prejudice
Pemberton’s rights as an accused.

DECISION: WHEREFORE, premises considered, the Petition for Certiorari is DISMISSED for lack of
grave abuse of discretion resulting in lack or excess of jurisdiction. The prayer for the issuance of a writ
of mandatory injunction is likewise DENIED for lack of merit.

DE GUZMAN JR. VS. OCHOA

648 SCRA 677
MENDOZA, J
Doctrine: An order denying a motion to dismiss is an interlocutory order which neither terminates the
case nor finally disposes of it, as it leaves something to be done by the court before the case is finally
decided on the merits. As such, the general rule is that the denial of a motion to dismiss cannot be
questioned in a special civil action for certiorari which is a remedy designed to correct errors of
jurisdiction and not errors of judgment.
Therefore, an order denying a motion to dismiss may only be reviewed in the ordinary course of law by
an appeal from the judgment after trial. The ordinary procedure to be followed in such cases is to file an
answer, go to trial, and if the decision is adverse, reiterate the issue on appeal from the final judgment
FACTS: Respondent spouses Cesar and Sylvia Ochoa , through respondent Araceli Azones, ostensibly
acting as attorney-in-fact, filed an action in the RTC seeking the annulment of contract of mortgage,
foreclosure sale, certificate of sale and damages. The petitioners as defendants in the civil case, filed a
motion to dismiss, alleging the sole ground that the complaint did not state a cause of action.
RTC’s Ruling: RTC denied the petition and at the same time set the civil case for pre-trial, directing the
parties to submit their briefs.
Petitioner filed a second motion to dismiss, alleging that the certification against forum shopping was not
executed by the parties themselves. Respondents opposed the second motion to dismiss, RTC agreed with
respondents. Petitioners filed MR but RTC denied.
Petitioner went to CA via a petition for certiorari.
CA’s Ruling: CA denied for lack of merit, in its decision, it agreed with the RTC that following the
omnibus motion rule, the defects of the complaint pointed out by the petitioners were deemed waived
when they failed to raise it in their first motion to dismiss.
ISSUE: Whether the ‘omnibus motion rule’ is finally decided on the merits.

HELD:
Section 8, Rule 15 of the Rules of Court defines an omnibus motion as a motion attacking a pleading,
judgment or proceeding. A motion to dismiss is an omnibus motion because it attacks a pleading, that is,
the complaint. For this reason, a motion to dismiss, like any other omnibus motion, must raise and include
all objections available at the time of the filing of the motion because under Section 8, "all objections not
so included shall be deemed waived." As inferred from the provision, only the following defenses under
Section 1, Rule 9, are excepted from its application: [a] lack of jurisdiction over the subject matter; [b]
there is another action pending between the same parties for the same cause (litis pendentia); [c] the
action is barred by prior judgment (res judicata); and [d] the action is barred by thestatute of limitations
or prescription.
An order denying such may only be reviewed in the ordinary course of law by an appeal from the
judgment after trial. Only in exceptional cases where the denial of the motion to dismiss is tainted with
grave abuse of discretion that the court allows the extraordinary remedy of certiorari. A motion to dismiss
is an omnibus motion because it attacks a pleading, that is, the complaint. For this reason, a motion to
dismiss, like any other omnibus motion must raise and include all objections available at the time of the
filing of the motion because under Section 8, “all objections not so included shall be deemed waived.
DECISION: WHEREFORE, the petition is DENIED.