CASE DIGEST : Bachrach v. Icaringal

G.R. No. L-45350             May 29, 1939

BACHRACH MOTOR CO., INC., plaintiff-appellant,

vs.

ESTEBAN ICARAÑGAL and ORIENTAL COMMERCIAL CO., INC., 

FACTS: On June 11, 1930, defendant herein, Esteban Icarañgal, with one Jacinto Figueroa, for value received, executed in favor of the plaintiff, Bachrach Motor Co., Inc., a promissory note. Thereafter, promissors defaulted in the payment of the agreed monthly installments; wherefore, plaintiff instituted in the Court of First Instance of Manila an action for the collection of the amount due on the note. Judgment was there rendered for the plaintiff. The other defendant herein, Oriental Commercial Co., Inc., interposed a third-party claim, alleging that by virtue of a writ of execution issued in civil case No. 88253 of the municipal court of the City of Manila, the property which was the subject of the mortgage and which has been levied upon by the sheriff, had already been acquired by it at the public auction on May 12, 1933. By reason of this third-party claim, the sheriff desisted from the sale of the property and, in consequence thereof, the judgment rendered in favor of the plaintiff remained unsatisfied. Whereupon, plaintiff instituted an action to foreclose the mortgage. The trial court dismissed the complaint and, from the judgment thus rendered plaintiff took the present appeal.

ISSUE: WON there is a splitting of cause of action

HELD: The SC held that contract that do several things is divisible but if the contract is entire and the breach is total there can only be one cause of action. It is intended to prevent repeated litigation between the same parties. A complaint for the recovery of personal property with damages for detention states a single cause of action which cannot be divided into an action for possession and one for damages. SC rules that in absence of statutory provision, mortgagor may choose either to file personal action or real action to foreclose the mortgage but by no means it affect his cause of action be impaired for each two remedies is complete in its self