Justices reverse heirship ruling

The CNMI Supreme Court has reversed the trial court’s decision in a probate case that distributed land to an heir claimant.

The justices ruled that the claim of inheritance by Maria Dela Cruz Iglesias’ heirs should not have been barred.

“The probate code does not require heirs to come forward with inheritance claims until after the trial court conducts an heirship proceeding,” said the high court’s ruling penned by associate justice John A. Maglona and concurred by chief justice Miguel S. Demapan and justice pro tem Herbert D. Soll.

The justices said that in a probate proceeding, the trial court is not barred from subsequently adjudicating decedent Maria Cepeda Rios’s rightful heirs.

Maria Iglesias, as Rios’ sole heir under the Chamorro custom of poksai, is entitled to Rios’ property.

The justices remanded the case to the trial court for proceedings consistent with their opinion.

According to court records, Rios was born on Saipan in 1867. Rios married Francisco Rios and they had no children. She had three sisters: Regina, Ana, and Emelia, and one brother, Luis Cruz Cepeda.

Ana married Juan Ada. Their son, Vicente Cepeda Ada, married Dolores Diaz, and they had a son, Vicente D. Ada, the appellee.

In 1890 Maria Iglesias was born. The trial court determined that Rios adopted Maria Iglesias through the Chamorro custom of “poksai” and that Rios raised Maria Iglesias as “pineksai.”

Poksai is a Chamorro custom involving the raising or nurturing of a child by an adult or adults other than the child’s biological parents. Pineksai is a person raised or being raised under poksai.

Maria Iglesias married Jose Iglesias and had 11 children. Rosa Sablan, a daughter of Maria Iglesias and Jose Iglesias, stated that Rios lived in the same house as Maria Iglesias “because she was the one that “poksai-ed”—that raised—her and that she was still a young girl when decedent Rios and Francisco Rios had asked for her to be her child.

Rios died on June 30, 1944. At the time of her death, she lived with Maria Iglesias.

A land document from 1941 indicates decedent as the owner of Lot 1764, the Saipan land at issue.

In January 1945, Juan filed a statement of death or disappearance of owner or lessee, indicating that decedent was the owner of Lot 1764. In 1975, Maria Iglesias died. In 1982, Rosa Sablan, Consolacion I. De Leon Guerrero, Petra Iglesias Macaranas, and Eugenia Iglesias Nauta filed a petition with various government agencies seeking ownership of Lot 1764.

Maria’s heirs attempted to register the lot with the Land Commission Office. Registering the land prompted Vicente D. Ada to file a lawsuit against Maria’s heirs in the trial court, claiming he was the owner of the lot.

The lawsuit was never litigated to final resolution.

In 1989, Vicente Ada filed the probate case and in June 1990, the trial court entered a decree of final distribution in Ada’s favor.

Maria’s heirs filed a lawsuit against Ada to set aside the final distribution decree.

The parties eventually stipulated to an order that set aside the 1990 final distribution and reopened the probate case.

The parties hoped to determine the heirs of Rios’s estate and how to distribute the estate’s property.

Jesus Iglesias Sablan served as estate administrator.

In 2004, the trial court issued its findings which determined that Rios adopted Maria Iglesias through poksai and that Rios raised Iglesias as pineksai.

In May 2006, the trial court issued its final order, holding that laches barred the claims of Maria’s heirs and distributed Rios’s property to Ada.

Jesus I. Saban appealed.