The general rule in adoption is that if the adopter is married and has children, the adoption must be filed by the couple jointly and must be with the consent of the adopter’s other children, 10 years old or older, so as to ensure harmony among the prospective siblings. So if the adoption is not jointly filed or there is no consent of the spouse as well as the adopter’s children, can the adoption made by adopter still be considered legal? These are the questions answered in this case of Henry.
Henry is married to Lila. Even if their marriage appeared to be in trouble because Henry allegedly had homosexual tendencies and because of their incompatibilities, they still had a child after more than one year of marriage. The child, however, had a congenital disease and lived only for nine days. So, two months after the child’s death, Lila left Henry.
Seven years after their marriage, however, Lila and Henry reconciled, although they still lived separately. One year after their reconciliation during which Henry would visit Lila, Lila gave birth to Mina. Eventually, they separated permanently although they still remained friends.
When Henry was already 70 years old, he filed a Petition for adoption of Gina and Allen in the Regional Trial Court (RTC) of another town in the province where he lived. The adoptees were allegedly the children of Emilia, whom he met and fell in love with in the town where he lived when he was separated from Lila. He alleged that since he had no child with Lila, he was not able to fulfill his dreams to parent a child. However, with the presence of his two illegitimate children, Gina and Allen, his dreams are fulfilled and it is his intention to legalize their relationship and surname. He further said that the children have been under his custody for about five years already because their mother Emilia had died.
In two months’ time, after hearing Henry’s petition, the RTC approved the adoption of Gina and Allen because no opposition had been filed by any person, including the government.
For being remiss in supporting their child Mina while showering gifts to his driver Francis, up to the extent of adopting Gina and Allen without her and Mina’s knowledge and consent, as well as for blatantly lying to the RTC, Lila filed a complaint for disbarment of Henry. But while said complaint was still pending, Henry died at 70 years old.
So Lila and Mina filed a Petition for Annulment of the Judgment of Adoption of Gina and Allen in the Court of Appeals. They alleged that they learned of said judgment only five years after it was issued; that Lila’s affidavit of consent filed in court was fraudulent and that the birth certificates of Gina and Allen have different sets of information regarding the age of Emilia when she gave birth, and the father of the children wherein it appears that he was the father whereas the birth certificate on file with the National Statistics Office (NSO) shows that the father is Francis. Lila and Mina likewise alleged that Gina and Allen were not the illegitimate children of Henry, but the legitimate children of Francis and Emilia.
The CA, however, denied their petition for failure to show that the RTC lacked jurisdiction due to lack of personal notice to them and that there is extrinsic fraud. The CA ruled that the fraudulent affidavit and the fraudulent information in the different sets of birth certificates were perpetrated during the trial and thus could not be considered as extrinsic fraud as required in an action for annulment of judgment. Was the CA correct?
No, said the Supreme Court. It is correct that lack of jurisdiction over the subject matter or over the parties and extrinsic fraud are the only grounds for which a Petition for Annulment of Judgment may be availed of. In this case there is really lack of jurisdiction and extrinsic fraud.
Jurisdiction of the court is determined by the statute in force at the time of the commencement of the action, which is RA 8552, which requires that the adoption by the father of a child born out of wedlock must be not only with the consent of his wife but also the consent of his legitimate children ten years or older. So, Henry must file a joint petition for adoption together with Lila or get her consent to the adoption, since the children to be adopted are elevated to the level of legitimate children. This is to ensure harmony between the spouses.
The written consent of Mina, who is Henry’s legitimate child over 10 years old, is also necessary to insure harmony among the prospective siblings. So Lila and Mina should have been personally notified of the Petition for Adoption. The constructive notice by publication of the petition as claimed by Henry is not enough. Hence since there is no personal notice to Lila and Mina, it never validly acquired jurisdiction.
There is also extrinsic fraud in this case. When the fraud is employed by a party precisely to prevent the participation of any other interested party, the fraud is extrinsic regardless of whether the fraud was committed through the use of forged documents or perjured testimony during the trial. In this case, Henry’s actions prevented Lila and Mina from having a reasonable opportunity to contest the adoption. So the judgment of adoption of Gina and Allen is really null and void (Castro and Castro vs. Gregorio and Gregorio, G.R. 188801, Oct. 15, 2014)