GROUNDS FOR PRELIMINARY ATTACHMENT:

The circumstances under which a writ of preliminary attachment may be issued are set forth in Section 1, Rule 57 of the Rules of Court, to wit:

SEC. 1. Grounds upon which attachment may issue. — At the commencement of the action or at any time before entry of judgment, a plaintiff or any proper party may have the property of the adverse party attached as security for the satisfaction of any judgment that may be recovered in the following cases:

(a) In an action for the recovery of a specified amount of money or damages, other than moral and exemplary, on a cause of action arising from law, contract, quasi-contract, delict or quasi-delict against a party who is about to depart from the Philippines with intent to defraud his creditors;

(b) In an action for money or property embezzled or fraudulently misapplied or converted to his own use by a public officer, or an officer of a corporation or an attorney, factor, broker, agent, or clerk, in the course of his employment as such, or by any other person in a fiduciary capacity, or for a willful violation of duty;

(c) In an action to recover the possession of personal property unjustly or fraudulently taken, detained, or converted, when the property, or any part thereof, has been concealed, removed, or disposed of to prevent its being found or taken by the applicant or an authorized person;

(d) In an action against a party who has been guilty of a fraud in contracting the debt or incurring the obligation upon which the action is brought, or in the performance thereof;

(e) In an action against a party who has removed or disposed of his property, or is about to do so, with intent to defraud his creditors;

(f) In an action against a party who resides out of the Philippines, or on whom summons may be served by publication.

           

    The purposes of preliminary attachment are: (1) to seize the property of the debtor in advance of final judgment and to hold it for purposes of satisfying said judgment, as in the grounds stated in paragraphs (a) to (e) of Section 1, Rule 57 of the Rules of Court; or (2) to acquire jurisdiction over the action by actual or constructive seizure of the property in those instances where personal or substituted service of summons on the defendant cannot be effected, as in paragraph (f) of the same provision (PHILIPPINE COMMERCIAL INTERNATIONAL BANK vs. JOSEPH ANTHONY M. ALEJANDRO, G.R. No. 175587, September 21, 2007, YNARES-SANTIAGO, J.).