BLITZ NOTES IN REMEDIAL LAW FOR THE 2015 OCTOBER BAR EXAMS: The old provision under Section 23, Rule 14 of the Revised Rules of Court provided that: Section 23. What is equivalent to service. The defendant’s voluntary appearance in the action shall be equivalent to service. Under Section 20, Rule 14 of the 1997 Rules of Civil Procedure, the provision now reads as follows: Sec. 20. Voluntary Appearance. — The defendants voluntary appearance in the action shall be equivalent to service of summons. The inclusion in a motion to dismiss of other grounds aside from lack of jurisdiction over the person of the defendant shall not be deemed a voluntary appearance. What remains the same, carry (sic) over from the old doctrine, is that the issue of jurisdiction must be raised seasonably. But everything else changed. What changed is that: if a motion is filed, whatever kind it is, it need no longer be for the sole and separate purpose of objecting to the jurisdiction of the court because the motion may raise myriad issues in that one motion of special appearance as long as the objection to the jurisdiction of the court is included. xxx What necessarily changed also is that the medium of “special appearance” is no longer restricted to a motion to dismiss because one could now file any type of motion provided you included the issue of lack of jurisdiction due to defective service of summons. Thus, the “two motions to dismiss” and the “motion to inhibit” may be treated as “special appearance” since they all included the issue of lack of jurisdiction due to non-service of summons. They did not constitute as submitting the movant to the jurisdiction of the court.
Posted on: Wed, 21 Jan 2015 23:09:59 +0000
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