Thinking Pinoy Blogger Rey Joseph Nieto during the senate hearing on fake news yesterday. 10/04/2017 Photo by Geremy Pintolo

Trillanes: Let this be a lesson to bloggers.

A libel case filed by Sen. Antonio Trillanes IV against blogger Rey Joseph “RJ” Nieto was approved by the Pasay Prosecutor’s Office for filing in court.

The case stemmed from the supposed false and derogatory statements made by Nieto against Trillanes in 2017 in his widely popular “Thinking Pinoy” Facebook page.

The controversial post generated 62,000 reactions and 15,759 shares.

Among the “derogatory” posts by Nieto was US President Donald J. Trump reportedly calling Trillanes a “narco” which is a colloquial word for “drug lord.”

The resolution called Nieto’s story malicious and untrue.

The prosecutor’s office acknowledged that while public officials should not be onion-skinned, this should not be an excuse for anyone to make baseless accusations and to make up stories.

The case against Nieto falls under Section 4(c)(4) of Republic Act No. 10175 or the Cybercrime Prevention Act of 2012, said the resolution.

“Respondent may be indicted Cyber-libel, libel being committed via Facebook, which necessarily uses a computer system,” the resolution read.

Nieto did not file a counter-affidavit during the preliminary investigation of the case, the resolution added.

Nieto once served as a consultant at the Department of Foreign Affairs. He had run-ins with other bloggers and members of the mainstream media and had been summoned to congressional probes on “fake news.”

“The false imputation, at the time it was posted, was sufficient to induce the viewers/audience on Facebook to suppose and understand that the complainant was guilty of certain offense or was sufficient to impeach his honesty, virtue or reputation,” said the resolution.

Trillanes said the indictment of Nieto should serve as a warning to other bloggers to be careful with their social media posts.

While libel as a crime has been prosecuted for decades, cyber libel was only recognized as a crime in 2012 under RA 10175.

A test case for cyber libel prior to the passage of RA 10175 was dismissed in 2011 by Antipolo City Regional Trial Court Judge Mary Josephine Lazaro.

Lazaro ruled at the time that the case for Internet libel filed by cosmetic surgeon Vicki Belo cannot be prosecuted because of “jurisdictional constraints.”

Belo filed the case against lawyer Argee Guevarra over his allegedly “slanderous” comments on his Facebook page in 2009.

According to Guevarra, Lazaro anchored her dismissal on improper venue without considering the issues he raised such as the Justice Department’s ruling that there is no such crime as Internet libel “which should bar prosecutors from even entertaining such complaints.”

With the passage of RA 10175, Trillanes’ case against Nieto will be precedent-setting.

The Belo-Guevarra case was considered as the Philippines’ first Facebook-related libel case that was dismissed because cyber libel was not yet recognized as a crime then.

The world’s very first known defamation suit with Facebook as the platform of dissemination was, on the other hand, filed in 2008 by British businessman Matthew Firsht against a former friend in school Grant Raphael.

The elements of libel under Philippine laws include defamatory imputation, publicity, malice and identification.