BEATRIZ GONZALES V.

CFI MANILA, 104 SCRA 481 (1981)

FACTS: Benito Legarda y dela Paz (Benito II), son of Benito Legarda y Tuazon (Benito
I), died and was survived by his widow, Filomena and their 7 children. The real properties
left by his deceased father, Benito I, were partitioned in 3 equal parts by Benito IIs sisters
and his heirs pro-indiviso. One of his daughters, Filomena, died without issue and her
sole heiress was her mother, Filomena vda de Legarda
Mrs. Legarda executed an affidavit adjudicating to herself the properties she inherited
from her daughter as a result of which she succeeded her deceased owner as co-owner
of the properties held pro-indiviso by her other 6 children. Later, Mrs. Legarda executed
two handwritten documents disposing of the properties which she inherited from her
daughter in favor of her 16 grandchildren (the children of her sons). Eventually, Mrs.
Legarda and her 6 surviving children partitioned the co-owned property

Mrs. Legarda died and in the testate proceeding of her estate, Beatriz Gonzales, one of
her daughters, filed a motion to exclude in the inventory of the properties inherited from
Filomena, the deceased daughter, on the ground that said properties were reservable
and should be inherited by Filomenas 3 sisters and 3 brothers, not by the 16
grandchildren of Mrs. Legarda, or Filomenas nephews and nieces. She also filed an
action securing a declaration that the properties are reservable which Mrs. Legarda could
not bequeath in her holographic will to her grandchildren to the exclusion of her 6 chidlren

It is contended here than the properties in question are not reservable properties because
only relatives within the third paternal line have survived and that when Mrs. Legarda
willed the properties to her grandchildren, who are third degree relatives of Filomena and
who belong to the paternal line, the reason for the reserva troncal has been satisfied: to
prevent persons outside a family from securing, by some special accident of life, property
that should otherwise have remained therein.

ISSUE: Whether the properties could be conveyed by will to the 16 grandchildren

(reservees within the third degree) to the exclusion of the 6 children (reservees within the
second degree)

HELD: No. Mrs. Legarda could not convey in her holographic will to her 16 grandchildren
the reservable properties she inherited from her daughter because the reservable
properties did not form part of her estate. The reservoir cannot make a disposition mortis
causa of the reservable properties as long as the reservees survived the reservoir.

Art 891 clearly indicates that the reservable properties should be inherited by all the
nearest within the third degree from prepositus who in this case are the 6 children of Mrs.
Legarda. She could not select the reservees to whom to the reservable properties should
be given and deprive the other reservees of their shares therein. To allow the reservoir to
make a testamentary disposition of the reservable properties in favor the reservees in the
third degree and, consequently, to ignore the reservees in the second degree would be a
glaring violation of Art 891, this cannot be allowed.

Mrs. Legarda could not dispose of the properties in question in her will even if the
disposition is in favor of relatives within the third degree from Filomena. The said
properties, by operation of Art 891, should go to Mrs. Legardas 6 children as reservees
within the second degree from Filomena. Reservees do not inherit from the reservor but
from the prepositus, of whom the reservees are the heirs mortis causa subject to the
condition that they must survive the reservor.

The reservation could be extinguished only by the absence of reservees at the time of
Mrs. Legardas death. Since at the time of her death, there were reservees belonging to
the second and third degrees, the disputed properties did not lose their reservable
character. The disposition of the properties should be made in accordance with Art 891
and in accordance with the reservors holographic will.