estate subject of the questioned Deed of Extrajudicial Settlement of

the Estate of Evarista M. dela Merced dated April 20, 1989. The
amendatory agreement/settlement shall form part of the original
Extrajudicial Settlement. With costs against defendants-appellees.
SO ORDERED. (Rollo, p. 41)
In the Petition under consideration, petitioners insist that being an illegitimate
child, private respondent Joselito is barred from inheriting from Evarista because
of the provision of Article 992 of the New Civil Code, which lays down an
impassable barrier between the legitimate and illegitimate families.
The Petition is devoid of merit.
Article 992 of the New Civil Code is not applicable because involved here is not a
situation where an illegitimate child would inherit ab intestato from a legitimate
sister of his father, which is prohibited by the aforesaid provision of law. Rather, it
is a scenario where an illegitimate child inherits from his father, the latter's share
in or portion of, what the latter already inherited from the deceased sister,
Evarista.
As opined by the Court of Appeals, the law in point in the present case is Article
777 of the New Civil Code which provides that the rights to succession are
transmitted from the moment of death of the decedent.
Since Evarista died ahead of her brother Francisco, the latter inherited a portion
of the estate of the former as one of her heirs. Subsequently, when Francisco
died, his heirs, namely: his spouse, legitimate children, and the private
respondent, Joselito, an illegitimate child, inherited his (Francisco's) share in the
estate of Evarista. It bears stressing that Joselito does not claim to be an heir of
Evarista by right of representation but participates in his own right, as an heir of
the late Francisco, in the latter's share (or portion thereof) in the estate of
Evarista.
Petitioners argue that if Joselito desires to assert successional rights to the
intestate estate of his father, the proper forum should be in the settlement of his
own father's intestate estate, as this Court held in the case of Gutierrez vs.
Macandog (150 SCRA 422 [1987])
Petitioners' reliance on the case of Gutierrez vs. Macandog (supra) is misplaced.
The said case involved a claim for support filed by one Elpedia Gutierrez against
the estate of the decedent, Agustin Gutierrez, Sr., when she was not even an
heir to the estate in question, at the time, and the decedent had no obligation
whatsoever to give her support. Thus, this Court ruled that Elpedia should have
asked for support pendente lite before the Juvenile and Domestic Relations
Court in which court her husband (one of the legal heirs of the decedent) had