ARREST, SEARCH and SEIZURE

The Checkpoint Case : Valmonte v. De Villa, G.R. No. 83988 September 29, 1989 (173 SCRA 211)

I. THE FACTS

On 20 January 1987, the National Capital Region District Command (NCRDC) was activated pursuant to
Letter of Instruction 02/87 of the Philippine General Headquarters, AFP, with the mission of conducting
security operations within its area of responsibility and peripheral areas, for the purpose of establishing
an effective territorial defense, maintaining peace and order, and providing an atmosphere conducive
to the social, economic and political development of the National Capital Region. As part of its duty to
maintain peace and order, the NCRDC installed checkpoints in various parts of Valenzuela, Metro
Manila.

Petitioners Atty. Ricardo Valmonte, who is a resident of Valenzuela, Metro Manila, and the Union of
Lawyers and Advocates For People’s Rights (ULAP) sought the declaration of checkpoints in Valenzuela,
Metro Manila and elsewhere as unconstitutional. In the alternative, they prayed that respondents
Renato De Villa and the National Capital Region District Command (NCRDC) be directed to formulate
guidelines in the implementation of checkpoints for the protection of the people. Petitioners
contended that the checkpoints gave the respondents blanket authority to make searches and seizures
without search warrant or court order in violation of the Constitution.

II. THE ISSUE

Do the military and police checkpoints violate the right of the people against unreasonable search and
seizures?

III. THE RULING

NO, military and police checkpoints DO NOT violate the right of the people against unreasonable search
and seizures.

xxx. Not all searches and seizures are prohibited. Those which are reasonable are not forbidden. A
reasonable search is not to be determined by any fixed formula but is to be resolved according to the
facts of each case, for example, the officer merely draws aside the curtain of a vacant vehicle which is
parked on the public fair grounds, or simply looks into a vehicle, or flashes a light therein, these do not
constitute unreasonable search.

The setting up of the questioned checkpoints in Valenzuela (and probably in other areas) may be
considered as a security measure to enable the NCRDC to pursue its mission of establishing effective
territorial defense and maintaining peace and order for the benefit of the public. Checkpoints may also
be regarded as measures to thwart plots to destabilize the government, in the interest of public
security. In this connection, the Court may take judicial notice of the shift to urban centers and their
suburbs of the insurgency movement, so clearly reflected in the increased killings in cities of police
and military men by NPA “sparrow units,” not to mention the abundance of unlicensed firearms and
the alarming rise in lawlessness and violence in such urban centers, not all of which are reported in
media, most likely brought about by deteriorating economic conditions – which all sum up to what one
can rightly consider, at the very least, as abnormal times. Between the inherent right of the state to
protect its existence and promote public welfare and an individual's right against a warrantless search
which is however reasonably conducted, the former should prevail.