Burgos vs.

Chief of Staff Facts: On 7 December 1982, Judge Ernani Cruz-Pao, Executive Judge of the then CFI Rizal, issued 2search warrants where the premises at 19, Road 3, Project 6, Quezon City, and 784 Units C & D,RMS Building, Quezon Avenue, Quezon City, business addresses of the "Metropolitan Mail" and "WeForum" newspapers, respectively, were searched, and office and printing machines, equipment,paraphernalia, motor vehicles and other articles used in the printing, publication and distribution of thesaid newspapers, as well as numerous papers, documents, books and other written literature allegedto be in the possession and control of Jose Burgos, Jr. publisher-editor of the "We Forum" newspaper,were seized. A petition for certiorari, prohibition and mandamus with preliminary mandatory and prohibitoryinjunction was filed after 6 months following the raid to question the validity of said search warrants,and to enjoin the Judge Advocate General of the AFP, the city fiscal of Quezon City, et.al. from usingthe articles seized as evidence in criminal case. The prayer of preliminary prohibitory injunction wasrendered moot and academic when, on 7 July 1983, the Solicitor General manifested that said articleswould not be used until final resolution of the legality of the seizure of said articles. Issue: Whether or not the seized documents are considered real property and were seized under disputed warrants? Held: Under Article 415[5] of the Civil Code of the Philippines, "machinery, receptacles, instruments orimplements intended by the owner of the tenement for an industry or works which may be carried onin a building or on a piece of land and which tend directly to meet the needs of the said industry orworks" are considered immovable property. In Davao Sawmill Co. v. Castillo, it was said that machinery which is movable by nature becomesimmobilized when placed by the owner of the tenement, property or plant, but not so when placed bya tenant, usufructuary, or any other person having only a temporary right, unless such person actedas the agent of the owner. In the present case, petitioners do not claim to be the owners of the land and/or building on which themachineries were placed. The machineries, while in fact bolted to the ground, remain movableproperty susceptible to seizure under a search warrant.