28/08/2026
The (SC) has ruled that courts may determine whether a party is alive or dead in an ejectment case when necessary to resolve who has the right to possess a property. However, this finding is only provisional and applies solely to the ejectment case.
In a Decision written by Chief Justice Alexander G. Gesmundo, the SC’s First Division emphasized this ruling as it denied the appeal filed by Belinda E. Soriano and her relatives (collectively, Belinda and others) in an ejectment case filed against them by Antonio V. Estrella (Estrella).
Estrella claimed ownership of a property in Quezon City where Belinda and others lived with his permission. When they refused his demand in 2012 to vacate the property so he could renovate it, Estrella filed an unlawful detainer case.
Belinda and others argued that the case should be dismissed because Estrella supposedly lacked the legal capacity to sue, having died in 1990. They provided his death certificate as evidence.
Ruling in Estrella’s favor, the SC held that Estrella had successfully overcome the presumption created by his death certificate. The parties themselves acknowledged that the Estrella who filed the case was the same Estrella named in the property’s title. Belinda and others never claimed that he was an impostor or disputed his identity. This, along with Estrella’s living presence, confirmed his legal capacity to sue.
The SC clarified that while the proper remedy to cancel a death certificate or correct a civil registry entry is to file a petition for cancellation, this does not prevent courts hearing ejectment cases from provisionally determining whether a party is alive or dead when necessary to resolve the issue of possession.
Accordingly, the SC held that a court’s finding on whether a party is alive or dead in an ejectment case is limited to determining that party’s legal capacity to sue and right to physical possession of the property.
The SC also ruled that the requirements for unlawful detainer were met. Belinda and others initially had lawful possession of the property; however, it became unlawful once Estrella demanded that they vacate and they refused, leading him to file the case within the one-year period required by law.
Read the full text of the Press Release at https://sc.judiciary.gov.ph/?p=171407.
Read the full text of the Decision at https://sc.judiciary.gov.ph/236333-belinda-e-soriano-et-al-vs-antonio-v-estrella/.
Copying of this content is subject to the SC PIO’s Credit Attribution Policy: https://sc.judiciary.gov.ph/credit-attribution-policy/.
