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    Cecilia Zulueta V CA

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    Paul Joshua Suba
    Cecilia Zulueta forcibly took private documents from her husband Dr. Alfredo Martin's clinic without his consent to use as evidence in their legal separation case. These documents included private correspondence between Dr. Martin and his alleged paramours. Dr. Martin sued Cecilia for recovery of the documents. The courts ruled the documents were private communications and inadmissible in evidence as neither spouse can violate the other's privacy without lawful order. Taking documents without consent violates the constitutional right to privacy of communication, even between spouses.

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    Cecilia Zulueta V CA

    Uploaded by

    Paul Joshua Suba
    213 views2 pages
    Cecilia Zulueta forcibly took private documents from her husband Dr. Alfredo Martin's clinic without his consent to use as evidence in their legal separation case. These documents included private correspondence between Dr. Martin and his alleged paramours. Dr. Martin sued Cecilia for recovery of the documents. The courts ruled the documents were private communications and inadmissible in evidence as neither spouse can violate the other's privacy without lawful order. Taking documents without consent violates the constitutional right to privacy of communication, even between spouses.

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    Cecilia Zulueta v CA

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    Cecilia Zulueta forcibly took private documents from her husband Dr. Alfredo Martin's clinic without his consent to use as evidence in their legal separation case. These documents included private correspondence between Dr. Martin and his alleged paramours. Dr. Martin sued Cecilia for recovery of the documents. The courts ruled the documents were private communications and inadmissible in evidence as neither spouse can violate the other's privacy without lawful order. Taking documents without consent violates the constitutional right to privacy of communication, even between spouses.

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Download as docx, pdf, or txt
    213 views2 pages

    Cecilia Zulueta V CA

    Uploaded by

    Paul Joshua Suba
    Cecilia Zulueta forcibly took private documents from her husband Dr. Alfredo Martin's clinic without his consent to use as evidence in their legal separation case. These documents included private correspondence between Dr. Martin and his alleged paramours. Dr. Martin sued Cecilia for recovery of the documents. The courts ruled the documents were private communications and inadmissible in evidence as neither spouse can violate the other's privacy without lawful order. Taking documents without consent violates the constitutional right to privacy of communication, even between spouses.

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    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
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    Cecilia Zulueta vs. CA, and Dr.

    Alfredo Martin
    Privacy of Communication. 

    Doctrine in Nachura: The right to privacy of communication may be invoked against the
    wife who went to the clinic of her husband and there took documents consisting of
    private communications between her husband and his alleged paramour.

    Facts: Cecilia Zulueta is the wife of Dr. Alfredo Martin. One day, she went to the clinic
    of her husband, together with her mom, her driver and Dr. Martin’s secretary and
    forcibly opened the drawer of her husband’s clinic and took 157 documents consisting
    of private correspondence between Dr. Martin and his alleged paramours, greetings
    cards, cancelled checks, diaries, Dr. Martins passport, and photographs without Dr.
    Martin’s knowledge and consent. The documents and papers were seized for use in
    evidence in a case for legal separation and for disqualification from the practice of
    medicine which petitioner had filed against her husband.

    Dr. Martin brought an action for the recovery of documents and papers, as well as
    damages against her wife before the RTC. The RTC ruled in his favor, declaring him to
    be the exclusive owner of such documents. The writ of preliminary injunction was made
    final and petitioner Cecilia Zulueta and her attorneys and representatives were enjoined
    from using or submitting/admitting as evidence the documents and papers in question.
    On appeal, the Court of Appeals affirmed the decision of the Regional Trial Court.
    Hence this petition.

    Cecilia’s side: She contends that the case of Alfredo Martin vs Alfonso Felix, Jr. (NOTE:
    the case is between her husband, Dr. Martin and a lawyer, atty. alfonso) where the
    court ruled that the documents and papers were admissible in evidence and that the
    use of those documents by Atty. Alfonso did not constitute gross malpractice and gross
    misconduct. 

    Issue: WON the documents in question are inadmissible in evidence.

    Held: Yes. Indeed the documents and papers in question are inadmissible in


    evidence. The constitutional injunction declaring the privacy of
    communication and correspondence [to be] inviolable is no less
    applicable simply because it is the wife (who thinks herself aggrieved by
    her husbands infidelity) who is the party against whom the
    constitutional provision is to be enforced. The only exception to the
    prohibition in the Constitution is if there is a lawful order [from a] court or when
    public safety or order requires otherwise, as prescribed by law. Any violation of
    this provision renders the evidence obtained inadmissible for any purpose in
    any proceeding.

    The intimacies between husband and wife do not justify any one of them
    in breaking the drawers and cabinets of the other and in ransacking
    them for any telltale evidence of marital infidelity. A person, by
    contracting marriage, does not shed his/her integrity or his right to
    privacy as an individual and the constitutional protection is ever
    available to him or to her.

    The law insures absolute freedom of communication between the spouses by


    making it privileged. Neither husband nor wife may testify for or against the
    other without the consent of the affected spouse while the marriage
    subsists. Neither may be examined without the consent of the other as to any
    communication received in confidence by one from the other during the
    marriage, save for specified exceptions. But one thing is freedom of
    communication; quite another is a compulsion for each one to share what one
    knows with the other. And this has nothing to do with the duty of fidelity that
    each owes to the other.

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