Nachura, J.:
Facts:
1. This is a petition for
review on certiorari under
Rule 45 of the Rules of Court, seeking to reverse and set aside the CA decision
and resolution which reversed and set aside the RTC decision on the civil case.
The resolution denied the MR filed by the petitioners .
2. In 2002, petitioners filed a Complaint for Easement of Right of Way against
the respondent Patrocinio L. Marcos and alleged therein that they are the
owners of Lot No. 21553; while respondent is the owner another lot.
3. Since the petitioners had
no access to a public road to and from their property, they claimed to have
used a portion of Lot No. 1 in accessing the road since 1970. Respondent,
however, blocked the passageway with piles of sand. Though petitioners have
been granted another passageway by Spouses Arce, the owners of another adjacent
lot.
4. Hence the complaint before the RTC. Instead of filing an Answer,
respondent filed a motion to dismiss on the ground of lack of cause of action
and noncompliance with the requisite certificate of non-forum shopping.
5.
The RTC denied respondent’s motion to dismiss.
6. Respondent denied that he allowed anybody to use Lot No. 1 as passageway
and that petitioners’ claim of right of way is only due to expediency and not
necessity. He also maintained that there is an existing easement of right of
way available to petitioners granted by the Spouses Arce. The RTC declared that
respondent’s answer failed to tender an issue, and opted to render judgment on
the pleadings and thus deemed the case submitted for decision.
7.
RTC rendered a decision in favor of the petitioners, granting a
right of way over Lot 01 after finding that petitioners adequately
established the requisites to justify an easement of right of way in accordance
with Articles 649 and 650 of the Civil Code.
8. On appeal, the CA reversed
and set aside the RTC decision and dismissed petitioners’ complaint. It
concluded that there is no need to establish an easement over respondent’s
property since the Arce spouses had already provided an access road which is
adequate. It emphasized that the convenience of the dominant estate is never
the gauge for the grant of compulsory right of way. Hence, this
petition. Petitioners contend that respondent's lot is the shortest route
in going to and fro their property to a public street and where they used to
pass.
ISSUE:
W/N petitioners are entitled to a legal easement
NO. The petition is
without merit. Petitioners failed to
show sufficient factual evidence to satisfy the enumerated requirements under
Art. 650 (NCC).
1.
By its very nature, an
easement involves an abnormal restriction on the property rights of the
servient owner and is regarded as a charge or encumbrance on the servient
estate. It is incumbent upon the owner of the dominant estate to establish by
clear and convincing evidence the presence of all the preconditions before his
claim for easement of right of way may be granted.
2.
Mere convenience for the dominant estate is not
what is required by law as the basis of setting up a compulsory
easement. The convenience of the dominant estate has never been the
gauge for the grant of compulsory right of way. The true standard for the grant of the legal right is
"adequacy." In order to justify the imposition of an
easement of right of way, there must be real, not fictitious or artificial,
necessity for it. As such, when there is
already an existing adequate outlet from the dominant estate to a public
highway, as in this case, even when the said outlet, for one reason or another,
be inconvenient, the need to open up another servitude is entirely unjustified.
3. Petitioners had already been granted a right of way through the other
adjacent lot. There is an existing outlet to and from the public
road. Other lot owners use the said outlet in going to and coming from the
public highway.
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