Pinoy fashion designer files $2-M suit against Maharlika

Puey Quiñones, an internationally known Filipino fashion designer, has filed a $2-million defamation suit against Claire Contreras, known as “Maharlika,” an “attack dog” vlogger with a YouTube channel called Boldyak TV.

In a virtual press conference at 1:30 a.m. Friday (Manila time), Quinones and his lawyer Keith Gregory said that after a series of letters to Contreras to cease and desist from maligning Quiñones, the celebrity designer opted to file a case in the Superior Court of the State of California in Los Angeles.

Quiñones, who is based in the US, said Contreras had maligned him and First Lady Liza Araneta Marcos in talking about his designs and business practices.

"It (vlog) was titled 'Designer Katandem ni Butod.’ I don't want to put (the exact words) in my mouth, but it was like saying 'tandem in scamming people,’" Quiñones said.

Contreras claimed that Quiñones’s designs were counterfeit, “not his own,” and that he had been scamming the people of the Philippines by swindling the First Lady whom he dresses.

Gregory said Maharlika's allegations have greatly impacted Quiñones, his business, his reputation, and his life in Manila and the United States.

"This is a civil court action where the defendant is liable for the damages that she has got to pay to Quiñones," Gregory said.

Quiñones said cybercrime cases have also been filed by his lawyers in the Philippines.

"I don't understand why she involved the First Lady, where (her) hate is coming from, or why she is bad-mouthing the First Couple," Quiñones said, pointing out that he does not know nor has ever met Contreras.

"Before the vlog, (my) business was doing well. I had shows in Malacañang, the US," he said.

But after Contreras started attacking him and the First Lady, "projects were canceled, proposals were rejected,” which affected the factory he put up in the Philippines.

Gregory said they will ask YouTube to take down Contreras’s vlog once the court grants them a favorable ruling.