Case ID: pr_6/html/0471-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "Mb. Justice HebNÁNdez,", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

Curbelo v. Arrieta et al.
    Appear from the District Court of Arecibo.
    No. 102.
    Decided May 6, 1904.
    Appeal — Appeal in Cassation. — The act of March 12, 1903, converting the court of cassation into a court of appeals, did not leave in force and effeet the provisions of the old Law of Civil Procedure granting appeals, but those which fix the procedure, repealing such as relate to the conduct of the appeal in cassation.
    Id. — An appeal lies only in those cases in which an appeal in cassation would formerly lie.
    Id. — Pinal Judgment. — An appeal lies from final decisions only, it being understood by such those which put an end to the action or make its continuation impossible.
    STATEMENT OP THE CASE.
    This is an appeal taken by Jose Peruchet Castell in a decla-claratory action instituted by Serafina Curbelo de Diaz against Miguel Arrieta Dorregaray, in the District Court of Arecibo, involving a claim to joint ownership, José Peruchet Castell and Francisco Gumersindo Díaz, the latter as assignee of Curbelo, having also intervened. The appellant was represented in the Supreme Court by Attorney Jacinto Texidor, the respondents failing to appear.
    Under date of April 16 of last year, Serafina Curbelo, with the consent of her husband, Arturo E. Diaz, filed a complaint in the District Court of Arecibo against Miguel Arrieta, praying that in due time judgment be rendered, declaring her full and absolute owner of the one-fifth part of a house standing on the plaza in the town of Camuy, as joint owner thereof, and of which Arrieta had been in possession for over fifteen years, and that the defendant be adjudged to deliver said portion of joint ownership and all the corresponding products and profits thereof, with costs taxed against him.
    Upon answering the complaint Miguel Arrieta prayed that the same be dismissed, with costs against the plaintiff, and having alleged, among other things, that he had by public deed sold to José Peruchet Castell all his rights and actions in aforesaid house, the plaintiff asked that notice of the complaint be served upon Peruchet y Castell, who returned the same with such remarks as were deemed conducive to his case.
    At this stage of the proceedings Francisco G-umersindo Díaz Yalcárcel appeared to the record, alleging that by public deed, executed July 20,1903, of which he accompanied a copy, Serafina Curbelo had assigned to him all her rights and actions in the aforesaid house, and requested that he be entered as a party to the suit as assignee of said Curbelo, and subrogated to all her rights and actions. On August 20 of aforesaid year, an order was made admitting Díaz Yalcárcel as a party to the suit in the above-mentioned capacity, and directing that three days’ notice of said petition be given to the defendants.
    
      Counsel for José Perucliet, besides entering a protest of nullity against aforesaid order, asked that the same be reconsidered and vacated, and that the petition giving rise to said order be referred to the parties, so that they might make snch statements as were deemed advisable, before Francisco Gumersindo Díaz could be considered as subrogated to the rights and actions of Serafina Curbelo. In an order of the 27th of August, aforesaid, the Arecibo court took notice of the protest of nullity, and declared that the rehearing prayed for did not lie, whereupon Peruchet took an appeal from aforesaid order of August 27.
    The appeal having been allowed and the record forwarded to this Supreme Court, after citation of the parties, the same was taken up under the proper procedure and a day set for the hearing, which took place, counsel for the appellant being the only party present.
    
      Mr. Texidor, for appellant.
    The respondent did not appear.
   Mb. Justice HebNÁNdez,

after making the above statement of facts, delivered the opinion of the court.

The act of March 12,1903, establishing the Supreme Court as a court of appeals, did not leave in full force and effect all the provisions of the Law of Civil Procedure allowing appeals, but only those under which the procedure conforms to the provisions of the Law of Civil Procedure for suits of greater import, suppressing the proceedings known by the name of “apuntamiento,” as prescribed by section 3 of aforesaid act, which expressly repealed, under section 2, all the sections of the Law of Civil Procedure establishing proceedings for appeals in cassation.

The aforesaid act of March 12, in prescribing, under section 4 thereof, that in all cases where reference is made in the Law of Civil Procedure to appeals in cassation, the same shall be construed as meaning ordinary appeals, clearly reveals that it was the intention of the legislator that appeals to the Supreme Court shall now be allowed from the same decisions as those that could formerly be the object of appeals in cassation, under the Law of Civil Procedure.

Said law, in articles 1687 and 1688, specifies the decisions from 'which appeals in cassation, now therefore on appeal, conld formerly be resorted to, and the subject-matter of the present appeal cannot he considered as included in aforesaid enumeration, since it deals with a decision which cannot he described as final, inasmuch as it does not terminate the action nor render its continuation impossible.

We adjudge that we should declare.and do declare that the appeal taken by José Peruchet Castell cannot be considered, and impose costs upon appellant. The record is ordered to be returned to the District Court of Arecibo, with a certificate of the present decision, for such action as may he proper.

Chief Justice Quiñones and Justices Figueras and Mac-Leary concurred.

Mr. Justice Sulzbacher did not sit at the hearing of this case.