Spec Pro Class 2020

FACTS:

          Remedios  Tiosejo died with neither descendants nor ascendants. She left real and personal properties. In her last will and testament, she bequeathed to her collateral relatives all her properties and designated Rosario Tan and upon the latter’s death, Jesus Fran, as executor.

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          Jesus Fran filed a petition for the probate of Remedios’ last will and testament.     

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      The heirs did not file any opposition in the probate judgment of 13 November 1972, thus the will become uncontested.

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          The probate court rendered a decision admitting the will to probate. Then, a Project of partition was submitted by the executor to the Court. The project of partition based on the dispositions made in the will and signed by all the devisees and legatees was submitted with the exception of Luis  Fran, Remedios Mejia and respondent Concepcion Espina. The private respondents still did not make any objections. Thereafter, the probate court issued it order approving the partition.

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          Later, the aforesaid branch which issued the order was converted to a Juvenile and Domestic Relations Court.

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          In 1980, Cocepcion Espina, et. Al filed a Petition for Consideration  alleging that the probate Court never acquired jurisdiction over the previous case, since petitioner Jesus Fran failed to submit to the Court the original of the will, depriving them to examine the will.

 

ISSUE:

          Whether or not it is necessary that the original of the will be presented in order for the Court to acquire jurisdiction

 

HELD:

         No. In several rulings of the Supreme Court, it ruled that it is not necessary that the original of the will be attached to the petition.

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          That the annexing of the original  will to the petition is not jurisdictional requirement which allows the filing of a petition for probate by the person named therein regardless of whether or not he is in possession of the will or the same is lost or destroyed.

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          In the instant case, a copy of the original will and its English translation were attached to the petition and made integral parts of the same. It is to be presumed that upon the filing of the petition, the Clerk of Court, or his duly authorized subordinate, examined the petition and found that the annexes mentioned were in fact attached thereto. Hence, the order of partition issued by the old probate court is final and executory.