Arrest warrant served vs. Leo: Lastimosa posts bail for  libel case

Veteran broadcaster and The Freeman columnist Leo Lastimosa posted a P10,000 bail yesterday morning after he surrendered to the police due to a warrant of arrest issued against him for a libel case filed by Cebu Gov. Gwendolyn F. Garcia.

Lastimosa was fetched at the ABS-CBN compound in Jagobiao, Mandaue City by Sr. Supt. Augusto M. Marquez, Jr., head of the Regional Intelligence and Investigation Division of the Police Regional Office-7.

Marquez clarified that it was not an arrest, but he only escorted Lastimosa to the sala of Regional Trial Court judge Geraldine Faith Econg, who issued the arrest order.

Econg later ordered Lastimosa’s release after he paid the cash bond for his temporary liberty.

“Happy ko nga na release nako,” Lastimosa said.

Lastimosa admitted to The Freeman that he really expected to be arrested at the airport when he arrived last Sunday after a vacation in Hong Kong.

According to Lastimosa, his trip to Hong Kong was planned even before the case was raffled off to Econg’s sala.

In fact, Lastimosa said, he informed the judge, through a common friend, about his trip abroad.

He explained that he did not have a chance to postpone his trip to attend to his warrant of arrest immediately saying that he cannot afford to pay the airline rebooking fee and the reservation that he already made for his hotel accommodation.

There was no intention to evade arrest, he pointed out.

He added that he was also there to give moral support to a sister-in-law who underwent surgery for a brain tumor.

Lastimosa said that while he was in Hong Kong, he already made arrangements with Marquez for his surrender. He said that he chose to surrender to Marquez, not because he is close to the police officer, but because he was the one ordered by the court to implement the arrest warrant.

The court is yet to schedule Lastimosa’s arraignment pending the resolution by the Department of Justice of his petition for review on the prosecutor’s finding probable cause to indict him of the crime of libel.

Lawyer Celso Espinosa, Lastimosa’s counsel, said that Econg will wait for 60 days before setting the case for arraignment as the DOJ reviews the pending petition.

Espinosa however is confident that they will have a strong defense in the case.

Lastimosa on the other hand admitted that he is now more careful in his commentaries.

“Duha ka butang akong gibantayan either mo lay low ko or masubrahan hinuon,” Lastimosa said.

According to Lastimosa, while it is not everyday that he is discussing the alleged corruption in the Cebu International Convention Center, but he will still continue to talk about it whenever there is a chance to discuss it in his radio program.  

The Cebu City Prosecutors’ Office earlier found probable cause to indict Lastimosa of the libel case that Garcia has filed.

The case stemmed from Lastimosa’s April 14 column in The Freeman entitled “Paugat ni Gwen.”

Lastimosa allegedly imputed a vice to the governor by portraying her in his column that she is a “fair-weathered” friend and a traitor to her political ally, then Mandaue City Mayor Thadeo Ouano.

Lastimosa wrote in his column that the governor’s silence in the controversy involving the ASEAN summit projects is because of the involvement of Ouano.

The columnist also questioned Garcia’s sincerity in helping Ouano because of the governor’s alleged failure to utilize her political clout in order to convince Malacañang to delay the implementation of the preventive suspension on Ouano.

Lastimosa imputed that Garcia was trying to save herself because if she would not be careful the alleged anomalies in the ASEAN-related projects would allegedly reach the Capitol grounds.

The governor said that the alleged malicious imputations made by Lastimosa in his column have unduly exposed her to public ridicule especially to Ouano, his family and relatives.

Lastimosa also induced to the mind of the readers that she was directly responsible for the monumental expenses incurred by the government and involved in the overpricing of the lampposts that lit Cebu’s major thoroughfares during the international gathering. — (/NLQ)