G.R. No. 185121 January 18, 2010
This case is about a claim for damages based on malicious prosecution.
To entitle petitioners Tiu and Limanch-O Hotel to damages for malicious prosecution,
they needed to prove the following elements:
(1) That the respondent City had caused their prosecution;
(2) That the criminal action ended in their acquittal;
(3) That, in bringing the action, the City had no probable cause; and
(4) That it was impelled by legal malice—an improper or a sinister motive.
Both parties concede that the first two elements were present in this case. What needs to be determined is whether or not petitioners Tiu and Limanch-O Hotel have proved the last two elements.
No evidence was shown that there had been bad blood between respondent City and petitioners Tiu and Limanch-O Hotel prior to the filing of the criminal charge, which circumstance if present could justify a malicious motive in filing the charge. Resort to judicial processes, by itself, is not an evidence of ill will which would automatically make the complainant liable for malicious prosecution. Otherwise, peaceful recourse to the courts will be greatly discouraged and the exercise of one’s right to litigate would become meaningless and empty.
Even if the Court were to concede that the City branded petitioners Tiu and Limanch-O Hotel as thieves, asked the people not to patronize their business, and had been overly zealous in pursuing the criminal complaint that it filed, these are not the legal malice contemplated in suits for malicious prosecution as the determining factor is evil motive in bringing the action, not the acts exhibited by the complainant after the case had been filed.
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