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The Court found that the pieces of evidence presented by PLDT, when taken together, were more than sufficient to support a finding that test calls were indeed made by PLDT’s witnesses using Mabuhay card with PIN code number 332 1479224 and, more importantly, that probable cause necessary to engender a belief that HPS Corporation, et al. had probably committed the crime of Theft through illegal ISR activities exists. These pieces of evidence include affidavits of PLDT people, call detail records, results of a traffic study conducted by PLDT on 20 direct telephone lines subscribed by HPS, among others.
The Court also found that the subject search warrants were not general warrants because the items to be seized were sufficiently identified physically and were also specifically identified by stating their relation to the offenses charged which are Theft and Violation of PD 401 through the conduct of illegal ISR activities. According to the Court, a search warrant issued must particularly describe the place to be searched and persons or things to be seized in order for it to be valid, otherwise, it is considered as a general warrant which is proscribed by both jurisprudence and the 1987 Constitution.
The Court held that PLDT had legal personality to file the petition saying that the case at bar does not involve an ordinary criminal action which requires the participation and conformity of the City Prosecutor or the Solicitor General when raised before appellate courts. The Court further held that PLDT’s petition before the CA was properly given due course despite the non-fulfillment of the requirement of the filing of a motion of reconsideration (of the May 23, 2001 Joint Order) due to the peculiar circumstances obtaining in this case. It said that the said rule is not absolute and that jurisprudence has laid down exceptions, which include where petitioner was deprived of due process, when the filing of a petition for certiorari is proper notwithstanding the failure to file a motion for reconsideration. In the case at bar, the Court stressed that it was “apparent that PLDT was deprived of due process when the trial court expeditiously released the items seized by virtue of the subject search warrants without waiting for PLDT to file its memorandum and despite the fact that no motion for execution was filed by respondents which is required in this case.”
The Court also held that PLDT did not commit forum shopping because the appeal that PLDT elevated to the CA was an examination of the validity of the trial court’s action of quashing the search warrants that it initially issued while, on the other hand, the petition for certiorari was an inquiry on whether or not the trial court judge committed grave abuse of discretion when he ordered the release of the seized items subject of the search warrants despite the fact that its May 23, 2001 Joint Order had not yet become final and executory.
The Court reversed Laurel v. Abrogar which had ruled that ISR activity does not constitute the crime of theft under Art. 308 of the RPC since international long distance calls and the business of providing telecommunication or telephone services are not personal properties under Art. 308 of the RPC when it granted PLDT’s motion for reconsideration. Here, the Court categorically stated that an ISR activity is an act of subtraction covered by the provisions on Theft, and that the business of providing telecommunication or telephone service is personal property, which can be object of Theft under Article 308 of the Revised Penal Code (RPC). (HPS Software and Communication Corporation v. PLDT, GR No. 170217; PLDT v. HPS Software and Communication Corporation, GR No. 170694, Dec. 10, 2012)
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