01 Ching Kian Chuan V CA
01 Ching Kian Chuan V CA
01 Ching Kian Chuan V CA
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G.R. No. 130360. August 15, 2001.
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* SECOND DIVISION.
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note that the complaint initially filed with the RTC was for
infringement of copyright. The trial court’s resolution subject of
Tan’s petition under Rule 65 before the CA concerns the
correctness of the grant of the writ of preliminary injunction. The
only issue brought before the CA involved the grave abuse of
discretion allegedly committed by the trial court in granting the
writ of preliminary injunction. The Court of Appeals in declaring
that the wrapper of petitioner is a copy of Ceroilfood Shandong’s
wrapper went beyond that issue and touched on the merits of the
infringement case, which remains to be decided by the trial court.
In our view, it was premature for the Court of Appeals to declare
that the design of petitioner’s wrapper is a copy of the wrapper
allegedly registered by Ceroilfood Shandong. That matter remains
for decision after appropriate proceedings at the trial court.
QUISUMBING, J.:
1 2
This petition for review seeks to annul the decision
dated August 27, 1997 3
of the Court of Appeals which set
aside the resolutions dated October 13 and December 15,
1993 as well as the order dated March 1, 1994 4
of the
Regional Trial Court of Quezon City, Branch 94.
Petitioner Wilson Ong Ching Kian Chuan (“Ong”),
imports vermicelli from China National Cereals Oils and
Foodstuffs Import and Export Corporation, based in
Beijing, China, under the firm name C.K.C. Trading. He
repacks it in cellophane wrappers with a design of two-
dragons and the TOWER trademark on the upper-
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4 Id. at 34-49.
148
149
WHEREFORE the phrase “the order dated October 13, 1993 and
related orders, as well as the writ of preliminary injunction issued
by the respondent court, are SET ASIDE as issued with grave
abuse of discretion” is hereby deleted in our resolution dated 08
August 1994. In all other respects, said resolution must be
maintained.
However, let a writ of preliminary injunction be issued
enjoining the herein respondents and any and all persons acting
for and in their behalf from enforcing and/or implementing the
Writ of Preliminary Injunction issued on October 15, 1993
pursuant to the Resolution dated October 13, 1993 of the PUBLIC
RESPONDENT in Civil Case No. Q-93-17628 entitled “WILSON
ONG CHING KIAN CHUAN, ETC. vs. LORENZO TAN, ETC.”
upon petitioner’s filing of a bond of P200,000.00.
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5 Id. at 50-53.
6 Id. at 54-55.
7 Id. at 23.
150
The Branch Clerk of Court of the RTC, Branch 94, Quezon City is
directed to elevate the records of Civil Case No. 293-17128 within
TEN (10) DAYS from notice.
The parties are given THIRTY (30) DAYS from notice to file
their memorandum or any pertinent manifestation on the matter,
after which the case
8
shall be considered submitted for decision.
SO ORDERED.
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8 Id. at 72-73.
9 Id. at 48.
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tection of P.D. No. 49. Said law allows an injunction in
case of infringement. Petitioner asserts that private
respondent has no registered copyright and merely relies
on the trademark of his principal abroad, which insofar as
Philippine laws is concerned, cannot prevail over the
petitioner’s copyright.
Private respondent, for his part, avers that petitioner
has no “clear right” over the use of the copyrighted wrapper
since ‘the PAGODA trademark and label were first adopted
and used and have been duly registered by Ceroilfood
Shandong not only in China but in nearly 20 countries and
regions worldwide. Petitioner was not the original creator
of the label, but merely copied the design of Ceroilfood
Shandong. Private respondent presented copies of the
certificates of copyright registration in the name of
Ceroilfood Shandong issued by at least twenty countries
and regions worldwide which although unauthenticated
are, according to him, sufficient to provide a sampling of
the evidence needed in11the determination of the grant of
preliminary injunction. Private respondent alleges, that
the trademark PAGODA 12
BRAND was registered in China
on October 31, 1979 while the trademark LUNGKOW
VERMICELLI WITH TWO-DRAGON 13
DEVICE was
registered on August 15, 1985.
To resolve this controversy, we have to return to basics.
A person to be entitled to a copyright must be the original
creator of the work. He must have created it by his own
skill, labor and judgment without directly copying or
evasively imitating the work of an-
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xxx
(o) Prints, pictorial, illustrations, advertising copies, labels, tags, and box
wraps. Chapter II, Article VI, Sec. 28. Any person infringing a copyright shall be
liable:
(a) To an injunction restraining such infringement.
11 Syndicated Media Access Corporation, et al. vs. CA, et al., 219 SCRA
794, 798 (1993).
12 CA Rollo, p. 51.
13 Ibid.
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14
other. The grant of preliminary injunction in a case rests
on the sound discretion of the court with
15
the caveat that it
should be made with extreme caution. Its grant depends
chiefly on the extent of doubt on the validity of the
copyright, existence of infringement,
16
and the damages
sustained by such infringement. In our view, the copies of
the certificates of copyright registered in the name of
Ceroilfood Shandong sufficiently raise reasonable doubt.
With such17 a doubt, the preliminary injunction is
unavailing. In Medina vs. City Sheriff, Manila, 276 SCRA
133, 139 (1997), where the complainant’s title was
disputed, we held that injunction was not proper.
Petitioner Ong argues that the Court of Appeals erred
and contradicted itself in its January 3, 1995 Resolution,
where it deleted the phrase “the order dated October 13,
1993 and related orders, as well as the writ of preliminary
injunction issued by the respondent court, are SET ASIDE
as issued with grave abuse of discretion” in its August 8,
1994 decision, and at the same time issued a writ of
preliminary injunction in Tan’s favor.
Ong’s claim (that the Court of Appeals in deleting the
aforequoted phrase in the August 8, 1994 decision
abandoned its earlier finding of grave abuse of discretion
on the part of the trial court), however, is without logical
basis. The appellate court merely restated in its own words
the issue raised in the petition: from a) whether the RTC
committed grave abuse of discretion, to b) whether Tan was
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