Sunday, July 15, 2012

The established doctrine is that when a party failed to interpose a timely objection to evidence at the time they were offered in evidence, such objection shall be considered as waived. - G.R. No. 171209

G.R. No. 171209

"x x x.


Relevant herein is the pronouncement of the Court in Caraan v. Court of Appeals,[53] wherein it accepted in evidence a mere photocopy of the document:

Petitioners’ asseveration that TCT No. RT-71061 (214949) should not have been admitted into evidence because private respondents merely presented the photocopy thereof is also unmeritorious.  Private respondents presented the original of TCT No. RT-71061 (214949) in open court during the hearing held onApril 13, 1994. x x x.

x x x x

Furthermore, no objection was raised by counsel for petitioners in their written opposition/comment to private respondents' offer of evidence regarding the fact that what was marked and submitted to the court was the photocopy.  In Blas vs. Angeles-Hutalla, the Court held thus:

The established doctrine is that when a party failed to interpose a timely objection to evidence at the time they were offered in evidence, such objection shall be considered as waived. In Tison v. Court of Appeals, the Supreme Court set out the applicable principle in the following terms:

[F]or while the documentary evidence submitted by petitioners do not strictly conform to the rules on their admissibility, we are, however, of the considered opinion that the same may be admitted by reason of private respondent's failure to interpose any timely objection thereto at the time they were being offered in evidence. It is elementary that an objection shall be made at the time when an alleged inadmissible document is offered in evidence, otherwise, the objection shall be treated as waived, since the right to object is merely a privilege which the party may waive.

As explained in Abrenica vs. Gonda, et al., it has been repeatedly laid down as a rule of evidence that a protest or objection against the admission of any evidence must be made at the proper time, otherwise, it will be deemed to have been waived. The proper time is when from the question addressed to the witness, or from the answer thereto, or from the presentation of the proof, the inadmissibility of the evidence is, or may be inferred.  

Thus, a failure to except to the evidence because it does not conform with the statute is a waiver of the provisions of the law. . . .

Hence, considering the fact that counsel for petitioners admitted that the photocopy of TCT No. RT-71061 (214949) is a faithful reproduction of the original thereof, stipulated with private respondents' counsel that what will be marked and submitted to the trial court as Exhibit A is the photocopy, and the lack of objection on such ground which is then deemed a waiver thereof, the admission into evidence of the photocopy of TCT No. RT-71061 was absolutely correct.[54]


Also instructive on this point is Quebral v. Court of Appeals,[55] where the Court ruled that:

Even if it were true that Exhibit K consisted of a mere photocopy and not the original of the petitioner’s letter, petitioner nevertheless failed to make timely objection thereto. As to when an objection to a document must be made, the Court ruled in Interpacific Transit, Inc. v. Aviles [186 SCRA 385 (June 6, 1990)]:

Objection to the documentary evidence must be made at the time it is formally offered, not earlier. The identification of the document before it is marked as an exhibit does not constitute the formal offer of the document as evidence for the party presenting it. Objection to the identification and marking of the document is not equivalent to objection to the document when it is formally offered in evidence. What really matters is the objection to the document at the time it is formally offered as an exhibit.

In the case at bench, no such timely objection was ever made. Consequently, the evidence not objected to became property of the case, and all the parties to the case are considered amenable to any favorable or unfavorable effects resulting from the evidence. x x x.”[56]


In any case, PEC-EDNP subsequently submitted to the RTC its original copies of Certificate of Title No. 1 and Deed of Donation dated April 24, 1974, together with its Motion for Reconsideration of the RTC Decision dated January 20, 1995.
 x x x."