Bea Alonzo slaps Cristy Fermin, Ogie Diaz with cyberlibel raps

For continuously throwing alleged insults over their social media pages and newspaper columns against actress Bea Alonzo, the Kapuso actress lodged cyber libel complaints against veteran showbiz columnists Cristy Fermin and Ogie Diaz on Thursday in a court in Quezon City.

Aside from Fermin and Diaz, Alonzo filed separate libel cases against Fermin and Diaz’s cohosts, and an online basher pretending to be a close friend of the actress at Quezon City Prosecutors Office.

In her complaint affidavit, Alonzo decided to take legal action after being a prey of false, malicious, and damaging information from the said basher, which was later published and became the subject of discussions on Fermin and Diaz’s online shows without any basis.

Atty. Joey Garcia, Alonzo’s lawyer, said the three cases stemmed from the defamatory comments in their respective online programs.

“These are three separate criminal cases and yes, three respondents per case, and the third case is different. It was filed against a certain individual who made on one of Bea’s social media platforms,” Garcia said.

He added that Alonzo filed the complaints because of the damaging statements they made against her.

“This is the very first time that Bea has pursued this legal action despite her more than two decades in the entertainment industry,” Garcia said.

The lawyer said Alonzo endured all the defamatory and malicious statements against her character by Fermin and Diaz camps in the past months or even years with silence, dignity and grace. 

“But there is always a limit and now is the time for definitive legal action,” Garcia said.

Garcia said they hoped the complaints would be resolved quickly as he also reminded social media personalities to exercise caution.

“We would like to remind all the social media users, especially vloggers to understand the legal implications of engaging in such behavior. To exercise caution and responsibility in all their online interactions, as defamatory statements and personal attacks are legally actionable,” he added.

Garcia maintained that the allegations in Alonzo’s complaints are supported with proper evidence.

“We expect that the Office of the City Prosecutor of Quezon City will issue subpoenas to the individuals concerned, who will be allowed to submit their counter-affidavits. We will be ready to respond when the time comes,” Garcia maintained.

On his Facebook page, Diaz said they would answer the accusations at the right time and proper forum.

“But as we always say on our page Ogie Diaz Showbiz Update, we hope they will end up together in the end,” Diaz said in Filipino, pertaining to the botched wedding of Dominic Roque and Alonzo which has been the topic of his conversation with his co-hosts in his Facebook page.