Cyber libel might face a new constitutional battle. 'I hope that the Philippine Supreme Court will now set things right,' says Maria Ressa's counsel, international human rights lawyer Amal Clooney.
at the Lower House to make it clear that cyber libel’s shelf life is only one year.
International human rights lawyer Amal Clooney, one of Ressa’s international counsels, said in a statement Tuesday, July 12: “I hope that the Philippines Supreme Court will now set things right – and restore the country’s constitutional commitment to freedom of speech.”Ordinary libel in the revised penal code prescribes in one year, meaning, one can only be sued within a year of publication of the questioned content.
The DOJ prosecutors then took out the pre-war Act 3326, which says that crimes under special laws which are punished by prison time six years or more should prescribe in 12 years. Rappler’s lawyer, former Supreme Court spokesperson Ted Te of the Free Legal Assistance Group, consistently brought up the fact that the Supreme Court, in ruling on the constitutionality of the cybercrime law, said that because cyber libel is not a new crime, it should follow ordinary libel’s one-year shelf life.
Neither Ressa nor Santos have to go to jail while they exhaust their remedies, the Supreme Court being the last stop.Rappler earlier said it welcomes the chance to go to the Supreme Court and question the constitutionality of cyber libel once more, including the long-standing debate to decriminalize it, which the High Court had been doing for a few cases.
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