Bloggers protected by revised libel law?

“WHY in Lanao?” asked some friends who read about expelled Iglesia ni Cristo minister Lowell Menorca II being arrested yesterday by Manila policemen on libel charges filed in that faraway corner of Muslim Mindanao.

The question, of course, can be answered only by the complainants and their lawyers. But many observers do wonder about the venue.

The arrest warrant was issued last Dec. 21 by the RTC Branch 21 of the 12th Judicial Region in Kapatagan, Lanao del Norte.

When accosted, Menorca was on his way to the Court of Appeals in Manila for a hearing on petitions for writs of habeas corpus and amparo filed against some top INC executives to restrain them from detaining or harassing him. He had also claimed receiving death threats.

In an interview with dzMM, Menorca said he was being tagged as behind a blog entitled “Silent No More” which mentions alleged anomalies in the INC. He said: “Dahil sa blog na ‘yon, maraming namulat... Maraming tao sa likod noon.”

He claimed that the blog carried proof of anomalies in the handling of INC funds. The Iglesia denied there were such irregularities.

Some of the readers’ early reactions (unedited) to the news in PhilSTAR:

Rndiz: Money and power talks... arrest is another form for keeping people silent.

Christal Mae Manzano: Libel should never be a case. It’s being used to delay a more important case.

Batangsupot: The timing of his arrest was just too obvious since he was heading to Court of Appeals to attend hearing against INC. The cops in civilian clothes who arrested him was under a certain Supt. Leonardo who’s a member of INC. Now, INC is again denying it has a hand on the arrest. One plus One = INC.

READMENOW2011: Ituloy nyo INC sanggunian and EV Manano ang gustong ipagawa ng ama sa inyo. Dagdagan nyo pa ang tindi, bagsik at karumaldumal na gawain. Tuluyan nyong wasakin.

• Blogs share umbrella of the free press?

WAS the filing of the criminal libel charge in Lanao proper? Let the lawyers and the judge sort that out. But as a longtime media practitioner, I take this opportunity to contribute some inputs.

We assume that Kauswagan was chosen as venue based on a claim that a browser in that part of Lanao found the blog maliciously maligning the good name of the Iglesia and some of its officers – so the alleged libel was also committed there.

Using the same argument, there could be countless cases filed in other places where the blog was accessed, viewed and found offensive. That could tie up Menorca and his lawyers tamping out the brushfire.

That is for blogs. But are blogs considered by the courts as similarly situated as, say, print media?

The law as I remember it (somebody might have amended it last night) says a libel suit can be filed only in the place of publication or, if the complainant is a government official, only in the place where the complainant holds office.

I understand that the libel sections on venue of the Revised Penal Code were amended years ago precisely to prevent undue harassment of the legitimate press.

Our legislators must have seen the horrible possibility of an editor, reporter or photographer of a Manila-based newspaper being sued in an obscure town in Cotabato and then vanishing on his way to locating the court.

The usual pretext for out-of-town complaints is that a local resident (affidavit attached) had read the story and was scandalized over the scurrilous libel.

We are grateful for such a venue-restricting amendment in our libel laws. But does that same protection apply to such bloggers as Menorca and others who may claim to be similarly situated?

Is anybody who uploads his ejaculations and calls a blog his accumulation of sporadic output to be considered a blogger and therefore a member of the press protected by law?

• Where’s a blog’s place of publication?

ONE element of libel is publication, which is generally defined as when a third person (aside from the writer/author and his subject/object) reads or views the piece.

But where is a blog’s place of publication to serve as venue for filing charges? In the cloud/s? Or the IP address of the computer used if no office address is given? Whom does a complainant sue if a blogger hides behind a pseudonym or uses a computer in an Internet café?

At any point during the trial, the accused media member may move for dismissal on the basis of wrong venue.

This has happened to me when I was editor-in-chief of the Philippine Daily Inquirer and I wrote about an abusive judge who had ordered the arrest of our hard-hitting columnist Ramon Tulfo.

I followed Mon to Bataan where the judge had him detained and then wrote about his honor’s actuations, prompting him to file libel charges against me too – but this time in his hometown Tarlac where he had connections.

I succeeded in having the case dropped for wrong venue. But I purposely moved so only after my indictment – so as to preclude his correcting his error by refiling the complaint in the proper venue (Bataan).

The trial judge did not intervene in the spirited exchange between me and the complainant that ranged from the definition of malice, the denotative and the connotative meanings of words, et cetera. He was either so engrossed or was kindly allowing us to let off steam.

After that sparring, the complaining judge from Bataan (still unaware I would move later to dismiss on the ground of wrong venue) and I shook hands apparently satisfied.

End of story: When I went to my car in the parking lot outside the courthouse, I found two of my tires punctured flat. Talagang wrong venue!

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