G.R. No. L-21424 November 15, 1967
GO BEE BEE @ SIOK KUAN, LIM TAN TONG @ LIM SUY HIO and JOSE LIM @ LIM SIONG HING, petitioners-appellees, vs. COMMISSIONER OF IMMIGRATION, ET AL., respondents-appellants.

FACTS

Petitioners-appellees filed a petition for a writ of habeas corpus, alleging they were unlawfully detained by immigration authorities pursuant to a presidential deportation order dated December 28, 1961, which they claimed had been revoked on December 30, 1961. The lower court ordered their release on bail. The Deportation Board had previously recommended petitioners for deportation due to communistic or subversive activities, utterance of counterfeit coins, and prostitution, leading to the President’s deportation order. Petitioners subsequently sought reconsideration and a new trial from the President and the Deportation Board, which was denied. To prove revocation, petitioners presented only (a) an alleged original of the revocation order signed not by the President but by an Assistant Executive Secretary after the words “By the President:”, and (b) a photostatic copy of an alleged duplicate signed by neither the President nor the Assistant Executive Secretary. The Commissioner of Immigration maintained the deportation order was outstanding, unrevoked, and final.

ISSUE

1. Did the President revoke on December 30, 1961, his last day in office, the order of deportation issued against petitioners on December 28, 1961?
2. Is the trial court possessed with jurisdiction to release petitioners from confinement on bail during the pendency of the proceedings for habeas corpus?
3. Are petitioners entitled to release on habeas corpus or are they lawfully detained by the Commissioner of Immigration pending deportation upon order of the President?

RULING

The Supreme Court reversed the lower court’s decision. On the first and decisive issue, the Court held that the documents presented by petitioners were utterly insufficient to prove the alleged revocation. The alleged original document was suspicious, as it was unexplained how it came into petitioners’ possession, lacked the President’s name on its face, and differed from the photostatic copy regarding routing remarks. The photostatic copy also lacked necessary signatures. The Court noted the alleged revocation was issued on the President’s last day in office, akin to a “midnight” order. Consequently, petitioners failed to discharge their burden of proving a valid revocation. Having resolved the first issue, the Court deemed it unnecessary to resolve the second and third issues. The Court ordered petitioners re-arrested for deportation pursuant to the presidential order. Their bail bonds were to remain outstanding until re-arrest. Costs were imposed on petitioners.