I WRITE on behalf of my client, Mr. Ernesto Eco of Supa, San Jose, Antique, anent his complaint about what you published in an article entitled “Worried about Peter”, a segment of Lapsus Calami which is an opinion column in Panay News, found on page 11 of the June 7, 2019 issue of Panay News, the relevant portion of which article reads:
“We in the local media are worried of what could have happened to our colleague Peter Jimenea who was forcibly dragged out by policemen in an eatery in La Paz, Iloilo City Friday last week. He is a respondent of a libel case filed by an unmanned ‘drug lord’. Naturally, he feared for his life.”
Please be informed that several persons, including the undersigned, who have read the aforeqouted portion of the article, are one in saying that you have used calculated words which nevertheless clearly and unmistakably alluded to and identify my client as the “unnamed ‘drug lord’” because my client is the only person who has filed against Peter Jimenea a libel case, docketed as Criminal Case No. 2018-03-9271 and currently pending before Branch 11, Regional Trial Court of Antique, which issued a bench warrant and, later, an alias bench warrant, on the basis of which Peter Jimenea was arrested by policemen in an eatery in La Paz, Iloilo City.
Needless to say, by your aforequoted article you have maliciously published facts connected with the private life of my client and offensive to the honor, virtue and reputation of my client.
I, therefore, demand upon you to write and send a letter, addressed my client, expressing: (a) an apology for your malicious use of the phrase “unnamed ‘drug lord’”; and (b) an undertaking that you would never again publish any similar article against my client, and to publish the said letter under the opinion column Lapsus Calami in your newspaper.
Please be forewarned that if you refuse or fail to comply with the foregoing just and valid demand within 10 days from your receipt of this letter, I will be constrained to initiate against you, for and on behalf of my client, a criminal complaint for Violation of Article 357 of the Revised Penal Code before the proper forum. – NERY G. DUREMDES, counsel for Ernesto Eco, Ground Floor, New Eagle’s Hotel, Bantayan, San Jose, Antique
