A veteran lawyer has filed libel and grave-coercion charges against five individuals that he accused of allegedly conspiring to commit overt acts to defame him and extort money from him. Lawyer Ferdinand Topacio has filed charges against Kevin Martin de Castro Vitug, Henry Lim, Jeanette Ty, Bernardo Joseph Reyes III and their lawyer, Dennis Taningco, before the Pasig City Prosecutors Office on Friday.
“All of the above-named respondents have conspired together and have jointly committed overt acts in a malicious attempt to defame me and extort money from me, among other persons, without any basis in fact and in law,” Topacio claimed in his nine-page complaint.
The case started when Jerianne Ejercito-Peña, niece of former president and now Manila Mayor Joseph Estrada, sought Topacio’s services as counsel and sought legal advice on several contracts that she executed on behalf of JE Admovers Inc. with respondent Reyes on November 2016.
“These transactions were, thus, then brought to my attention for the first time. Ejercito-Peña informed me that she was having problems with respondent Reyes and the other respondents who were supposedly other creditors of Admovers who invested through respondent Reyes,” Topacio said.
In an attempt to resolve the matter involving Ejercito-Peña and the respondents, Topacio invited them to a meeting in his office on November 22, 2016, in which Reyes and Vitug attended.
After the meeting that didn’t end up well, Topacio said he was surprised when he received several demand letters in different occasions in December 2016 from the complainants demanding him to pay a huge amount of money to them, otherwise, they will file nonbailable offenses against him.
“According to the letters further, I am ‘in connivance’ with my client and I ‘participated in the fraud’, which resulted in them losing their money,” Topacio complained.
“It goes without saying that I was extremely surprised to receive these letters, which were personally addressed to me and demanding payment from me personally considering that I have never ever entered into any transaction with respondents. Neither did I have any personal participation in the transactions involving respondents and my client. To repeat, I met Ms. Ejercito-Peña for the first time sometime in November 2016, way before the transactions referred to by herein respondents happened.”
He also added that: “In their demand letters, respondents failed to show, much less allege, why I was in any way liable, either personally or in conspiracy with anyone, to pay them the amounts they are claiming. They also failed to establish, much less state, that I issued or signed any of the checks indicated in the said letters. Hence, the respondents’ demand upon me to personally pay the amounts indicated in their demand letters have no basis in fact and in law.”