Stonehill v. Diokno, 20 SCRA 383 (1967)

Stonehill v. Diokno, 20 SCRA 383 (1967) 
FACTS:
Respondents herein secured a total of 42 search warrants against petitioners herein and/or the corporations of which they were officers, to search “books of accounts, financial records, vouchers, correspondence, receipts, ledgers, journals, portfolios, credit journals, typewriters, and other documents and/or papers showing all business transactions including disbursements receipts, balance sheets and profit and loss statements and Bobbins (cigarette wrappers),” as “the subject of the offense; stolen or embezzled and proceeds or fruits of the offense,” or “used or intended to be used as the means of committing the offense,” which is described in the applications adverted to above as “violation of Central Bank Laws, Tariff and Customs Laws, Internal Revenue (Code) and the Revised Penal Code.”
The petitioner contended that the search warrants are null and void as their issuance violated the Constitution and the Rules of Court for being general warrants.
The documents, papers, and things seized under the alleged authority of the warrants in question may be split into two (2) major groups, namely: (a) those found and seized in the offices of the aforementioned corporations, and (b) those found and seized in the residences of petitioners herein.
 
ISSUE: 
Whether or not the search warrants are null and void and violated the constitution and the rules of court.
 
RULING:
YES. warrants for the search of 3 residences null and void; searches and seizures made are illegal. To uphold the validity of the warrants in question would be to wipe out completely one of the most fundamental rights guaranteed in our Constitution, for it would place the sanctity of the domicile and the privacy of communication and correspondence at the mercy of the whims caprice or passion of peace officers.  The warrants for the search of three (3) residences of herein petitioners, as specified in the Resolution of June 29, 1962, are null and void; that the searches and seizures therein made are illegal; that the writ of preliminary injunction heretofore issued, in connection with the documents, papers and other effects thus seized in said residences of herein petitioners is hereby made permanent.