Breaking news from Channel 24’s Balitanghali (of GMA Channel 7 News Department): Satur Ocampo’s house, bedroom, his drawers, cabinets, beds, etc. were raided today at about 11 am by elements of the PNP, according to wife Bobbie Malay.
As described by Bobbie in the phonepatched interview of Channel 24, what took place was not just the enforcement, or attempted enforcement, of an arrest warrant. What took place was a search. The instances when a valid warrantless search can be enforced are: 1)search incident to a lawful arrest; 2) consensual search 3)border searches; 4) checkpoints; and like circumstances.
Search incident to a lawful arrest contemplates the aftermath of a lawful arrest where law-enforcers, right after arresting the subject of the arrest warrant (or the subject of a valid warrantless arrest) are authorized to search the immediate vicinity of the person arrested, for weapons and pieces of evidence that have been used in the commission of the crime. Immediate vicinity of the person arrested has been construed by the Supreme Court in one case as the premises that are literally within the reach or literally within arm’s reach of the person being arrested. The purpose of authorizing such warrantless search, as long as it is incident to a lawful arrest, is to prevent the destruction of evidence that may have been used in the commission of the offense, as well as to prevent the person arrested from reaching any weapon that may be used against the law-enforcers.
This was not the case here. No lawful arrest had been made. Satur was not in the house.
Can the law enforcers invoke the rule that allows police officers to break any enclosures to enforce a warrant of arrest? They can look inside a building, house, or room if they have reasonable ground to believe that the person to be arrested is inside the building, house, or room, but if the person to be arrested is not there, they cannot conduct a warrantless search of nooks and crannies and papers and drawers and cabinets and boxes and effects, that are obviously not hiding places of persons.
The rule that allows such enforcement of arrest warrants, also requires that the police officers first call out to the person being arrested, that he is about to be arrested, and if the police officers are being prevented from arresting such person, the police officers are authorized to break down any enclosures, i.e., break down doors or gates or fences or windows, etc. in order to get to the person to be arrested and enforce the arrest warrant.
That’s not what happened here. They conducted a search. As described by Bobbie, they looked under the bed, opened drawers, cabinets, etc. That was a search. Warrantless. That wasn’t a search incident to a lawful arrest and it was more than enforcement of an arrest warrant.
Is this whole operation being supervised by the Department of Justice and Malacanang?
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