Court of Appeals upholds closure of pornographic website

MANILA, Philippines - National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) agents were armed with a valid search warrant when they raided the operations base of the pornographic website www.boybastos.com in Muntinlupa two years ago, the Court of Appeals (CA) has ruled.

The CA rejected the petition of Mark Verzo, the website’s administrator, to invalidate the search warrant issued by Judge Romulo Villanueva of Muntinlupa Regional Trial Court Branch 276 in 2007.

In the decision, the CA said Villanueva had found probable cause that Verzo had violated Republic Act 9208, the Anti-Trafficking in Persons Act of 2003, when he issued the search warrant.

“In the instant case after the conduct of the technical surveillance on the website www.boybastos.com which identified the petitioner as the website’s administrator, proper physical surveillance and investigation were thereafter conducted by special investigators Jovenir and Dantis and which led the latter to believe that petitioner caused the advertisement of various internet porn sites through www.boybastos.com,” read the CA decision.

The CA said Villanueva followed the prescribed procedure in issuing the search warrant after personally questioning NBI special investigator Roel Jovenir and his witnesses.

“Undoubtedly, probable cause exists for the issuance of search warrant…as shown by the affidavits of Jovenir and Dantis who, after conducting investigation and surveillance, obtained personal knowledge of facts indicating that an offense involving violation of Section 5 of RA 9208 was being committed and that the objects sought in connection with the offense are in the place sought to be searched,” read the CA decision.

In his petition, Verzo said Villanueva committed “grave abuse of discretion” in issuing the search warrant to Jovenir, who had no personal knowledge of the facts upon which it was issued.

The search warrant was invalid because the lower court failed to take the deposition of the applicant and his witnesses, he added.

Jovenir along with special investigator Rosauro Dantis of the NBI-Anti Fraud and Computer Crimes Division investigated the operations of the website.