ABS-CBN Headstart anchor Karen Davila provided analytical questions: One hour before cyberlibel promulgation against journalists, possible 7-year prison, bail on appeal discretionary; 15 mins before promulgation while watching the courthouse scene was gut-wrenching for the resource person, apologies po

       This is the full length interview in Headstart, ABS-CBN, by Karen Davila one hour before promulgation in the cyberlibel case against Rappler CEO Maria Ressa and reporter Reynaldo Santos Jr. Said journalists faced a possible prison term of seven years with bail on appeal that day being discretionary on the court.
      In discussing the “Public Figure Doctrine”, elements of libel, penalties made harsher by cyberlibel, implications on all who use the internet throughout the interview, reference was made to the sources relied upon by the reporter and editors.
       It was also mentioned in the interview that the Shield Law was invoked in not disclosing the author of the intelligence report : resource person said “reporter” there… Clarification:  it was one of the editors who invoked the Shield Law on cross-examination.
(Postscript: the judge however opined that the complainant was a private person, thus, the Public Figure Doctrine, in the judge’s opinion, supposedly did not set in  —  for the judge)

      ABS-CBN covered the promulgation real-time simultaneously with insets and live cut-to-cuts at the Manila courthouse.

       After viewing this a week later: Upon seeing the courthouse corridor, live, teeming with camera crew and while watching ABS-CBN reporter Mike Navallo describe the scene 15 minutes before the promulgation — or in the last two minutes of the interview — there was a figurative wrenching in the gut – a manifestation of “i-have-a-bad-feeling-about-this…”

(di maiiwasan na tuluyan na rin pong gumulo ang buhok ko nuong “i-have-a-bad-feeling-about-this”  at  the close of the interview, sorry powz — because the judge had ignored all law when the prescriptive period was done away with from the very beginning …) 

      The discussion starts at 8:00 of the June 15 vid. (second video of five videos to be posted in the next few days)

2024 UPDATE c/o handling faculty: In the most recent (uploaded by the Supreme Court on Jan. 19, 2024) Supreme Court decision on libel, the Supreme Court clarified that libel prescribes in one year (handling faculty’s note: This thereby paves the way for the dismissal of the libel case against Rappler) : Causing vs. People, GR No. 258524, Oct. 11, 2023 at: https://sc.judiciary.gov.ph/258524-berteni-cataluna-causing-vs-people-of-the-philippines-regional-trial-court-of-quezon-city-branch-93-office-of-the-city-prosecutor-of-quezon-city-and-representative-ferdinand-ledesma-hernan/

     Credits: as stated in the video