Menéndez v. Cobb

28 P.R. 725
CourtSupreme Court of Puerto Rico
DecidedJuly 22, 1920
DocketNo. 2110
StatusPublished

This text of 28 P.R. 725 (Menéndez v. Cobb) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Puerto Rico primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Menéndez v. Cobb, 28 P.R. 725 (prsupreme 1920).

Opinion

Mr. Justice Aldrey

delivered the opinion of the court.

Eafael Inocencio Menéndez Eamos brought this action of ejectment in his own right and as the assignee of the hereditary rights of his sister, Juana Maria del Carmen Mercedes Eamos, they being the only children of Carmen Eamos y Eamos, who was the sole heir of Laureana Eamos, the late wife of Francisco Eegis Eamos Acosta. It is alleged that during the wedlock of his grandmother, Laureana Eamos, with Francisco Eegis Eamos Acosta the latter acquired for the conjugal partnership a certain described property which, 'after the death of his grandmother, was purchased by Eafael Eamos at an execution sale in an action brought by him against Eamos Acosta and in which the heir of his grandmother was not summoned, and that the property, was sold by Eafael Eamos to defendants John B. Cobb and wife. He also alleged that there were certain defects in the proceeding which rendered it null and void.

The lower court dismissed the complaint and' Menéndez appealed from its judgment.

As Cobb and his wife, alleged, among other things, that [727]*727they were innocent third persons, we shall first examine the records of the property in the registry.

The first record of the property in question was entered in the Registry of Property of Caguas on 'December 22, 1883, in the name of Francisco Regis Ramos Acosta by virtue of a possessory title proceeding which was approved in October of the same year and in which it was shown that he acquired a part of the property by inheritance and a part by purchase. That record does not give the civil status of the person in whose 'name it was made, but only states that he was a resident and property owner of Caguas.

The second record was made on April 30, 1884, in the name of Agustín Puigmoler by virtue of a mortgage created in his favor by Francisco Regis Ramos Acosta in a public deed of the 8th of the same month and year, from which it appears that the mortgagor was married.

A cautionary notice marked “A” was made in 1891 of an attachment in a prosecution .against Regis Ramos for slander to secure the sum of 3,000 pesetas, the amount of the bond which he was required to give.

The third record is as follows:

“Record No. 3. — Folio 233. — Volume 4. — Rural property whose description appears from the preceding first record and notice letter A, to which I refer, it agreeing with that contained in the document now presented. This property is affected by a mortgage in favor of Agustín Puigmoler for the sum of one thousand dollars," as appears from the next preceding record, and by an attachment for the sum of three thousand pesetas, the amount of the bond required to be given by defendant Francisco Regis Ramos in a prosecution for slander, as appears from the preceding notice marked A. Francisco Regis Ramos acquired this property by purchase from Calixto Ramos, Pedro Juan Almedina,- Isaac Quinones and Maria Antonia Ramos, as appears from the said first record. An attachment having been levied on this property in a certain action brought by Rafael Ramos Acosta against Francisco Regis Ramos to recover the sum of three thousand dollars with interest at the rate of one per cent monthly from the eighteenth of January, 1898, until the, [728]*728payment of the said sum and the costs, regarding which attachment nothing appears in this registry, in execution of a judgment entered on March 14, last, by the District Court of Iiumacao against Francisco Regis Ramos, a writ of execution was issued on April 19, last, by Hon. Charles E. Foote, judge of said court,- by virtue of which the marshal of that court, Augusto Ortiz y Lebrón, advertised the sale of this property at public auction, and, there being no other bidders, it was sold to Rafael Ramos Acosta on May 21, last, for the sum of six thousand and eight dollars, which was not paid in cash because it had to be credited on the principal debt and the interest and costs. By virtue of the said writ Augusto Ortiz y Lebrón, twenty-eight years old, married and a resident of Huma-cao, as marshal of the said court, sells this property in the name and representation of Francisco Regis Ramos to Rafael Ramos Acosta, sixty-eight years old, property owner, married to Julia Santana Ji-ménez and a resident of this city, for the sum of six thousand and eight dollars. Rafael Ramos Acosta records in his name this property which he acquired by purchase and without special conditions. AH of the foregoing appears from the deed executed in Humacao on May 21, last, before notary Antonio de Aldrey y Montolio, the first copy of which was presented in this registry at eight o’clock a. m. of the fifth instant, according to entry one hundred and fifty-eight, folio fifty-five, volume ten of the journal. And all that has been stated being in conformity with the said document, I sign this in Caguas this eighth day of June, nineteen hundred and six. — ■ (Signed) S. Abella Bastón.”

The fourth record is in the name of J. B. Cobh as purchaser of the property from Rafael Ramos Acosta for the sum of $5,962.50, of which he retained $600 for the bond which encumbers the property. On the margin of this record there is an entry made in the year 1907, according’ to which the amount of the said bond was paid to Ricardo Menéndez Monsegur and Rafael Arce Rollet, $400 to the former and $200 to the latter, as had been stipulated in the deed of purchase and sale from Ramos to Cobb.

As we have seen from the registry, in the first record in the name of Francisco Regis Ramos it is not stated that he was married when he brought the possessory title pro[729]*729ceeding; therefore that record does not show that the property was community property. It is true that when the mortgage was recorded in favor of Pnigmoler in April, 1884, it was stated that Regis Ramos was married, hut this does not .show to third persons that he was also married in 1883 when he brought the possessory title proceeding, or that he acquired the property while married, for he might have married .after October, 1883, and that would not have made community property of the properties previously recorded in Ms name; therefore we can not hold that when Rafael Ramos, and afterwards Cobb, purchased the property it appeared clearly from the registry that the property had been acquired by Francisco Regis Ramos Acosta during wedlock and 'that, consequently, it belonged to the conjugal partnership. Ramos and Cobb purchased the property from a person who, according to the registry, had the capacity to sell it, and if, on account of the failure to join as a defendant the heir of the wife of Regis Ramos, the purchase at public auction by Ramos Acosta is null and void, as that fact does not clearly appear from the registry it can not affect the present owner, Cobb, in accordance with article 34 of the Mortgage 'Law, the case of Romeu v. Todd, 206 U. S. 358, and our jurisprudence in Sánchez v. Hartzell et al., 26 P. R. R. 620; People v. Riera, 27 P. R. R. 1, and Ayllón et al. v. González et al., ante, page 61, according to which third persons must only examine the records of the registry of property and are only prejudiced by such defects as appear clearly from the registry itself.

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Related

Romeu v. Todd
206 U.S. 358 (Supreme Court, 1907)

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Bluebook (online)
28 P.R. 725, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/menendez-v-cobb-prsupreme-1920.