SEC. 32. Review of decree of registration; Innocent purchaser for value.

— The decree of registration shall not

be reopened or revised by reason of absence, minority, or other disability of any person adversely affected thereby,
nor by any proceeding in any court for reversing judgments, subject, however, to the right of any person, including the
government and the branches thereof, deprived of land or of any estate or interest therein by such adjudication or
confirmation of title obtained by actual fraud, to file in the proper Court of First Instance a petition for reopening and
review of the decree of registration not later than one year from and after the date of the entry of such decree of
registration, but in no case shall such petition be entertained by the court where an innocent purchaser for value has
acquired the land or an interest therein, whose rights may be prejudiced. Whenever the phrase “innocent purchaser
for value” or an equivalent phrase occurs in this Decree, it shall be deemed to include an innocent lessee, mortgagee,
or other encumbrancer for value. Upon the expiration of said period of one year, the decree of registration and the
certificate of title issued shall become incontrovertible. Any person aggrieved by such decree of registration in any
case may pursue his remedy by action for damages against the applicant or any other persons responsible for the
fraud.

REMEDIES

1. New trial or reconsideration.

a. Within the period for taking an appeal, the aggrieved party may move the trial court to set aside the
judgment or final order and grant a new trial for one or more of the causes materially affecting the
substantial rights of said party. If the motion for new trial is granted, the judgment is set aside; if the
motion for reconsideration is granted, the judgment is merely amended. The period for filing either
motion is within the period for taking, not perfecting, an appeal. An appeal may be taken within
fifteen (15) days after notice to the appellant of the judgment or final order appealed from. Where a
record on appeal is required, the appellant shall file a notice of appeal and a record on appeal
within thirty (30) days after notice of the judgment or final order.

2. Relief from judgment; relief from denial of appeal.

a. When a judgment or final order is entered, or any proceedings is thereafter taken against a party in
any court through, accident, mistake, or excusable negligence, he may file a petition in such court
and in the same case praying that the judgment, order or proceeding be set aside.
b. When a judgment or final order is rendered by any court in a case, and a party thereto, by fraud,
accident, mistake, or excusable negligence, has been prevented from taking an appeal, he may file
a petition in such court and in the same case praying that the appeal be given due course
c. A “final” judgment or order (as distinguished from one which has “become final” or “executory” as of
right [final and executory]), is one that finally disposes of a case, leaving nothing more to be done
by the court in respect thereto. Conversely, an order that does not finally dispose of the case, and
does not end the court’s task of adjudicating the parties’ contention and determining their rights and
liabilities as regards each other, but obviously indicates that other things remain to be done by the
court, is “interlocutory

3. Appeal.
a. An appeal may be taken from a judgment or final order that completely disposes of the case, or of a
particular matter therein when declared by the Rules of Court to be appealable
b. No appeal may be taken from:
i. (a) An order denying a motion for new trial or reconsideration;
ii. (b) An order denying a petition for relief or any similar motion seeking relief from judgment;
iii. (c) An interlocutory order;
iv. (d) An order disallowing or dismissing an appeal;
v. (e) An order denying a motion to set aside a judgment by consent, confession or
compromise on the ground of fraud, mistake or duress, or any other ground vitiating
consent;
vi. (f) An order of execution;
vii. (g) A judgment or final order for or against one or more of several parties or in separate
claims, counterclaims, cross-claims and third-party complaints, while the main case is
pending, unless the court allows an appeal therefrom; and
viii. (h) An order dismissing an action without prejudice.
 c. In all the above instances where the judgment or final order is not appealable, the aggrieved party
may file an appropriate special civil action under Rule 65

4. Review of decree of registration.

a. Under the Torrens system of registration, the Torrens title becomes indefeasible and
incontrovertible one year from the issuance of the final decree and is generally conclusive evidence
of the ownership of the land referred to therein.33 But courts may reopen proceedings already
closed by final decision or decree when application for review is filed by the party aggrieved within
one year from the issuance of the decree of registration.34 The one-year period stated in Section
32 of PD No. 1529 within which a petition to reopen and review the decree of registration refers to
the decree of registration which is prepared and issued by the Land Registration Authority pursuant
to Section 31 of the Decree.

5. Reconveyance, generally
a. An action for reconveyance is a legal and equitable remedy granted to the rightful owner of land
which has been wrongfully or erroneously registered in the name of another for the purpose of
compelling the latter to transfer or reconvey the land to him. A landowner whose property was
wrongfully or erroneously registered under the Torrens system may bring an action, after one year
from the issuance of the decree, for the reconveyance of the subject property. Such an action does
not aim or purport to re-open the registration proceeding and set aside the decree of registration,
but only to show that the person who secured the registration of the questioned property is not the
real owner thereof. The action does not seek to set aside the decree but, respecting the decree as
incontrovertible and no longer open to review, seeks to transfer or reconvey the land from the
registered owner to the rightful owner.
b. Notwithstanding the irrevocability of the Torrens title already issued in the name of the registered
owner, he can still be compelled under the law to reconvey the subject property to the rightful
owner. The property is deemed to be held in trust for the real owner by the person in whose name it
is registered. The Torrens system was not designed to shield and protect one who had committed
fraud or misrepresentation and thus holds title in bad faith. In an action for reconveyance, the
decree of registration is respected as incontrovertible. What is sought instead is the transfer of the
property, in this case the title thereof, which has been wrongfully or erroneously registered in
another person’s name, to its rightful and legal owner, or to one with a better right.

6. Action for damages.

a. An action for reconveyance is not feasible where the property has already passed into the hands of
an innocent purchaser for value. But the interested party is not without a remedy — he can file an
action for damages against the persons responsible for depriving him of his right or interest in the
property
b. As earlier stated, a Torrens title can be attacked only for fraud within one year after the date of the
issuance of the decree of registration. Such attack must be direct and not by collateral proceeding.
The title represented by the certificate cannot be changed, altered, modified, enlarged or
diminished in a collateral proceeding. After one year from the date of the decree, the sole remedy
of the landowner whose property has been wrongfully or erroneously registered in another’s name
is not to set aside the decree but, respecting the decree as incontrovertible and no longer open to
review, to bring an ordinary action in the ordinary court of justice for reconveyance. However, if the
property has passed into the hands of an innocent purchaser for value, the remedy is an action for
damages

7. Action for reversion

a. Reversion connotes restoration of public land fraudulently awarded or disposed of to the mass of
the public domain and may again be the subject of disposition in the manner prescribed by law to
qualified applicants. It is instituted by the government, through the Solicitor General. But an action
for cancellation, not reversion, is proper where private land had been subsequently titled, and the
party plaintiff in this case is the prior rightful owner of the property
b. The Director of Lands has a continuing authority to conduct investigation, from time to time, to
determine whether or not public land has been fraudulently awarded or titled to the end that the
corresponding certificate of title be cancelled and the land reverted to the public domain. And the
fact that the title sought to be cancelled has, technically speaking, become indefeasible is not a
 hindrance to said investigation. For the government is not estopped by the error or mistake of its
agents, nor barred by prescription

8. Cancellation of title
a. In contrast to an action for reversion which is filed by the government, through the Solicitor
General, an action for cancellation is initiated by a private property usually in a case where there
are two titles issued to different persons for the same lot. When one of the two titles is held to be
superior over the other, one should be declared null and void and ordered cancelled. If a party is
adjudged to be the owner, pursuant to a valid certificate of title, said party is entitled to the
possession of the land covered by the title. The land does not “revert” to the mass of the public
domain, as in an action for reversion, but is declared as lawfully belonging to the party whose
certificate of title is held superior over the other. The judgment would direct the defeated party to
vacate the land in question, and deliver possession thereof to the lawful owner of the land.

9. Recovery from the Assurance Fund

a. Section 95 of the Property Registration Decree provides: “SEC. 95. Action for compensation from
funds. — A person who, without negligence on his part, sustains loss or damage, or is deprived of
land or any estate or interest therein in consequence of the bringing of the land under the operation
of the Torrens system of arising after original registration of land, through fraud or in consequence
of any error, omission, mistake or misdescription in any certificate of title or in any entry or
memorandum in the registration book, and who by the provisions of this Decree is barred or
otherwise precluded under the provision of any law from bringing an action for the recovery of such
land or the estate or interest therein, may bring an action in any court of competent jurisdiction for
the recovery of damages to be paid out of the Assurance Fund.”

10. Annulment of judgments or final orders and resolutions.

a. Rule 47 of the Rules of Court governs the annulment by the Court of Appeals of judgments or final
orders and resolutions in civil actions of Regional Trial Courts for which the ordinary remedies of
new trial, appeal, petition for relief or other appropriate remedies are no longer available through no
fault of the petitioner.

11. Criminal prosecution.

a. The State may criminally prosecute for perjury the party who obtains registration through fraud,
such as by stating false assertions in the application for registration, sworn answer required of
applicants in cadastral proceedings, or application for public land patent. This is rightly so, for to
give immunity from prosecution to those successful in deceiving the registration court or
administrative agency would, in effect, be putting a premium on perjury. It is the policy of the law
that judicial proceedings and judgments shall be fair and free from fraud, and that litigants and
parties be encouraged to tell the truth, and that they be punished if they do not. The prosecution for
falsification or perjury is a proceeding in personam which inquires into the criminal liability of the
accused.
b. On the matter of disposition of public lands, Section 91 of the Public Land Act provides that “the
statements made in the application shall be considered as essential conditions and parts of any
concession, title, or permit issued on the basis of such application, and any false statement therein
or omission of facts altering, changing, or modifying the consideration of the facts set forth in such
statements, and any subsequent modification, alteration, or change of the material facts set forth in
the application shall ipso facto produce the cancellation of the concession, title, or permit granted.”

AVAILABLE REMEDIES TO QUESTION THE VALIDITY OF JUDGMENT IN A REGISTRATION CASE (sec. 32-34)

 New trial or reconsideration under Rule 37

 Relief of judgment under Rule 38
 Appeal to the CA or SC in the manner as ordinary actions pursuant to Section 33 of PD 1529
 Review of Decree, Section 32
 Claim under Assurance Fund, Section 95
 Reversion under Section 101 of CA 141
 Cancellation of title
 Annulment of judgment under Rule 37
 Quieting of Title
 Action for reconveyance
 Criminal prosecution under the Revised Penal Code