QC residents join suit vs Torres

An association of residents in Quezon City has asked the Court of Appeals to allow it to join an earlier petition to nullify a Quezon City court’s decision awarding titles of a 24-hectare prime property to alleged land-grabber Wilfredo S. Torres.

Residents of Morning Star Heights in Culiat, Quezon City, filed a motion with the appellate court to intervene in the petition filed by K-Ville Townhomes residents against Torres and the Quezon City Regional Trial Court Branch 224.

Calling themselves the 682 Community Association Inc., the residents argued that the property they had purchased from Torres and occupied for close to 30 years was covered by the questionable QC RTC decision, and hence, have a “justiciable interest in the pending suit.”

“The intervenors’ rights and interests will be directly and necessarily affected by the outcome of this proceeding. If the petition fails, the effects include loss of their property which they bought from Torres using their lifetime savings, their home or residential abode for 30 years or so, dislocation and displacement,” they said in a Nov. 3 motion.

The intervenors were led by association president Rizalito dela Cruz Sr.

In September, K-Ville Homeowners residents asked the appellate court to nullify a ruling of Judge Tita Marilyn Payoyo-Villordon of the QC RTC-Branch 224 that recognized Torres’ ownership of a 23.7-hectare property in Quezon City.

The court later issued a 60-day temporary restraining order (TRO) stopping Villordon from implementing a 2010 writ of possession order that authorized Torres to take over the prime property.

The property straddles Sanville 1, 2, 3 and 4 subdivisions which include the K-Ville townhomes, K-Square and Metro Heights subdivisions, Arfel Homes, Sadel Court, Fernwood Gardens, including the St. Francis Chapel and a portion of the Claret Seminary, all in Barangay Culiat; and the Montessori School of Quezon City and a Wilcon Builders outlet on Visayas Avenue.

The residents said they purchased portions of Lot 682 from Torres in the 1980s for as much as P200,000, and for which Torres executed deeds of absolute sale.

They said that Torres had assured them that he would subdivide Lot 682 so the individual lots would be segregated from the mother title, and that individual titles would be issued to them.

But without their knowledge, Torres in 1990 moved for the cancellation of the Transfer Certificate Title No. 117143 covering 682. In 1996, Branch 224 ordered the reconveyance of Lot 682 to Torres, and granted his petition for the reconstitution of the title in his favor in 2006.

Morning Star Heights sits on Lot 682, which is part of the 23.7 hectare property claimed by Torres, the residents said.