Volume 5, Issue No. 35
OPINION/COMMENTARY
/ News That Fears None, Views That Favor Nobody /
. . . . . A community service of Romar Media Canada, The Filipino Web Channel (TheFilipinoWebChannel@gmail.com) and the Philippine Village Voice (PhilVoiceNews@gmail.com) for the information and understanding of Filipinos and the diverse communities in North America . . . . . .
Our latest as of Thursday, May 16, 2024
~ For more than once in her legal disputes, the publisher of Balita has shown a potential for theatre with a particular audience in mind: the fogies who rely on the tabloid for information instead of the internet. As she doesn't seem to fact-check wild allegations of wrongdoing that see print, the result could be catastrophic, especially financially. Still, her bravado, or false bravado, remains intact in her published declarations.
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TESS CUSIPAG LOSES DEFAMATION SUIT
False Bravado Could Be Catastrophic
Scorecard: 5 Cases, 3 Losses + 1 Jail Time, 2 Dismissed
By ROMEO P. MARQUEZ
Editor, The Filipino Web Channel
“Bravado may feel like a shield, but when you're telling yourself lies, it becomes a prison." ―
TORONTO - Sixteen months ago, Teresita "Tess" Cusipag of Balita declared she would hire "not just lawyers" but "good ones instead."
"I learned my lessons, being thrifty and underestimating," she said then, an intimation of the legal and financial debacle resulting from losses she suffered fighting two of four defamation lawsuits years past.
In one of them, the judge cited her for criminal contempt and sentenced to 21 days of incarceration in a women's facility. She was released after serving 13 days. (Related video: 'A Humbling Experience,' Says Balita Editor Tess Cusipag of Ordeal).
Now it would appear that she didn't keep her word. The "not-just-lawyers-but-good-ones" statement fell flat on her face as she lost the latest - the fifth in the list - defamation case filed against her, this time, by businesswoman Liwayway Miranda aka Lily Hammer.
(Related story:
Weeks before I wrote that bombshell story, I noticed a sudden uptick in the number of readers keeping track of a dozen articles about Balita and its publisher/editor posted on Filipino Web Magazine.
I thought the word has probably gotten out, though unpublished in any of the local periodicals, that Ms. Miranda has been successful in holding Ms. Cusipag liable for her libelous comments in Balita and on Facebook.
At the funeral of a common friend a month ago today, Ms. Cusipag surprisingly greeted me with a "Hi Romy". Since my departure from Balita in July 2019, I avoided her whenever I can despite well-meaning attempts by my favorite entertainment writer Baby K. Jimenez to restore the friendship.
Anyway as a courtesy, I returned her greeting with a cold "Hi" and left the room. Among the mourners was Tere Torralba who told me Ms. Cusipag even waived to me while driving out of the parking lot.
Those unexpected incidents had prompted me to write the story which I held on to since February when the Superior Court upheld Ms. Miranda and found Ms. Cusipag liable for defamation.
For her defense, she relied on a newly-minted lawyer, Dominador "Jun" Saludares, a long-time paralegal who was found by the Law Society of Ontario in 2019 to have engaged in professional misconduct, suspended for three months and made to pay $5,000 in costs.
"In this case," the Law Society wrote, "there was significant neglect of duty and an ultimate fraud of $434,764. But Mr. Saludares is a relatively new licensee. He was licensed only in 2013, and this matter took place in early 2015. He was also new to Canada, having come in 2010. He had no discipline history. The whole matter took place over a seven-week period and involved one client only."
(Full transcript at: https://www.canlii.org/en/on/onlst/doc/2019/2019onlsth12/2019onlsth12.html).
That brings us back to Ms. Cusipag's bravado. It seems obvious that she forgot to learn her lessons the two defamation cases she had lost have provided again by, in her own words, "being thrifty and underestimating."
Not to look down on Mr. Saludares, but he, in my considered opinion, was not a good choice to defend Ms. Cusipag and Balita from Ms. Miranda's defamation suit. For most of the years as a paralegal, he was engaged in real estate.
And that is not to say Ms. Miranda's case against Ms. Cusipag was not strong. It was strong and well-founded.
I thought this was a repeat of the same situation that had existed in two earlier defamation cases where litigants had enlisted experts in the field while Ms. Cusipag had relied on the simpleminded advice of a friend to hire his friend to represent her.
That was the cause for her saying to hire "not just lawyers" but "good ones instead" to litigate the disputes in the Ontario Superior Court.
To not have competent and robust representation - as what had happened to her in two cases where this reporter was also a defendant - was devastating personally, professionally and financially.
Mr. Saludares was called to the Ontario Bar sometime in January 2023, after working as a paralegal from August 2014, published documents show.
As a lawyer, his first serious client (in the case filed by Ms. Miranda) appeared to be Ms. Cusipag who, on January 20, 2023, was served a libel notice at her home office in Markham by a process server of the City of Toronto.
Ms. Cusipag is reportedly negotiating lowering and/or not paying damages to Ms. Miranda, the same tactic she had employed in the previous defamation cases. She eventually paid close to half a million each to the plaintiff.
As of this writing, Ms. Cusipag and Mr. Saludares have no comment. (Copyright 2024. All Rights Reserved).
Karma??? - Ores Ting, Scarborough
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