A Quezon City Regional Trial Court (RTC) has convicted Baguio City journalist Franklin ‘Frank’ Cimatu y Yapo of cyber libel over a Facebook post back in 2017.
In a decision dated Dec. 12 but was released only on Tuesday, the court said sentenced Yabu to five years, five months, and 11 days of imprisonment and ordered him to pay a total of Php 300,000 for moral damages.
The cyber libel was filed by former agriculture Secretary Emmanuel ‘Manny’ Piñol.
Piñol’s complaint stemmed from Cimatu's Facebook post that allegedly injured his “reputation, credit, and virtue” and exposed him to “public hatred, discredit contempt, and ridicule.”
In his Facebook post in 2017, Cimatu wrote “Agri Sec got rich by 21-M in 6 months. Bird flu pa more!”
“Taking into consideration the words used by Cimatu and the subject Facebook post which appears to be an imputation of a crime, the same is defamatory and thus, satisfies the first element of the crime of Cyberlibel,” the QC RTC said.
In his defense, Cimatu said the Facebook post was published in private and intended to be seen by his virtual friends only.
However, the court disagreed and said it found that the post was initially shared in a public setting.
The QC RTC also said that whether the post was true or not, Cimatu failed to provide proof to support his accusation against the former agriculture chief.
“The subject defamatory post made no specific details or acts committed to establishing that Piñol is a corrupt official who gained wealth on account of a crisis. This cannot be countenanced, more so when the only defense raised by the accused is that the subject post is privileged since the target was a public official,” it said.
Cimatu is a contributor to independent media Rappler.
He is the third Rappler journalist indicted with cyber libel following Maria Ressa and Rey Santos Jr.
