When the Philippine Entertainment Portal held its press conference on March 31, 2009, at the 8 Spices restaurant on Tomas Morato, Quezon City, it made two announcements.
One, PEP explained its "Letter from the Editor" apologizing to Richard Gutierrez, Michael Flores, Epy Quizon, and PEP readers, which had been posted on the site the night before.
Two, PEP announced it would release the results of its investigation into the March 29 Incident once completed. The March 29 Incident, for newcomers to the site, is the stuff of the article "Richard Gutierrez reportedly involved in a heated squabble with Michael Flores," uploaded in PEP last March 29.
It is an article that only a very few got to read.
And it's only right. The article was one I had deactivated right away upon discovering that, due to a break in editorial procedure, it had prematurely and inadvertently been uploaded. Its research was still in its inception stage; it still did not have the side of the stars named in the article; and it still had to reconcile various facts and details to tell the story well.
It was not, in short, the kind of article that PEP would have uploaded at any time, except through a mishap in normal operations—which is what happened exactly.
March 29 was a Sunday. The time of the upload was roughly 4:15 in the afternoon; the time of the deactivation, roughly 7:20 in the evening. In essence, the pullout came just three hours and five minutes after its uploading and within seconds of my finding out that the article was active on the site.
NOISE AND HYPE. At the time of the article's deactivation, it had been up on cyberspace no more than 185 minutes. In other words, a very brief period. The article had not yet made noise. It was the events that followed that made it noisy.
Annabelle Rama, mother and manager to Richard Gutierrez, wanted an apology posted in PEP. (In good faith, we put out one inside 23 hours of the article's pullout.) Next, she wanted the reporter who wrote the story paraded before television to apologize to her son. (In good faith, but without subjecting our reporter to that level of scrutiny, I offered to do the apology myself, which she agreed to.) Then, it became bigger. She wanted PEP to call a proper press conference within two days of the pullout. (Again in good faith, we did—inviting television, radio, print, and the web.)
Ruffa Gutierrez, sister to Richard and vice president of the family's Royal Era Entertainment & Artist Management, appeared on her morning show, Ruffa & Ai, on March 30, or just one full day after the party of Mark Reyes, and broadcast the issue on nationwide television. By evening of the same day, she appeared on SNN (Showbiz News Ngayon), again to broadcast the issue.
The matriarch of the family and managing director of Royal Era, Annabelle Rama, called for her own press conference just two days later, on April 1. The next day, Richard Gutierrez granted interviews with showbiz television talk shows also on the subject. And Jun Lalin, the Gutierrezes' publicist, had put the story out days earlier in Abante Tonite.
It had become noisy.
REPRINTING AN APOLOGY. For a better understanding of the PEP apology on the site, we reprint it, thus:
Letter from the Editor
This is a statement of clarification, correction, and apology.
Yesterday, March 29, at a little past 4:15 p.m., the Philippine Entertainment Portal (PEP) uploaded a story on Richard Gutierrez and Michael Flores alleging that the two actors had a confrontation on March 28 at director Mark Reyes's birthday celebration. The four-paragraph story ended by saying the PEP "at press time is still investigating the incident."
The fact is that a report did reach PEP about an incident that reportedly occurred at around 1 a.m. of March 29, allegedly involving Richard Gutierrez and Michael Flores. When I was told about this incident, I recognized that it was of interest to the public, and gave instructions to the staff to investigate further.
At around 7:20 p.m., my attention was called to the story having been uploaded in the site. I had it pulled out immediately. I felt that, at that point, we had not exhausted our probe into the facts of the incident. While we were able to get in touch with Michael Flores, Epy Quizon, and Leo Martinez, who were all guests at the party, we had not as yet interviewed other personalities, particularly Richard Gutierrez. For this we apologize.
To Richard Gutierrez, Michael Flores, and Epy Quizon who were named in the story, to PEP readers who may have been confused, and again, to Richard Gutierrez whose side of the story we failed to get, our sincerest apologies.
PEP will always maintain the best standards of web reportage, and, on the unhappy occasion that it fails to do so, will acknowledge its error.
A LIBEL SUIT. Unfortunately, the generosity of spirit I expected from the Gutierrezes was not forthcoming.
Even more disappointing, within minutes of wrapping up the press conference that they had asked me to hold, I was immediately threatened with a libel suit. This one rankled. Annabelle Rama and I already had a verbal agreement that, with my apology on the web and a press conference before the tri-media, we did not have to get the courts in the picture. Yet, I still got threatened with one right away, anyway.
On April 13, Richard Gutierrez filed a libel suit against PEP seeking a gargantuan P25 million in damages. Named respondents in the suit are me, as the website's editor-in-chief, our managing editor Karen Pagsolingan, and our staffwriter Ferdinand "Bong" Godinez.
Richard's line is that we "apologized for the wrong reason." What he wanted was for PEP to retract all the allegations in the article, to clear his name of any wrongdoing on the night in question, and basically say the whole article was invented!
INCOMPLETE INVESTIGATION. I could not do that. Not because I will not admit to a mistake in public—in fact, I just did, before the whole country, when I apologized for uploading the incomplete, unfair article—but because PEP had not completed its investigation.
In other words, we were still at the stage when even I, as editor, had to get to the bottom of that prematurely uploaded article. All I knew at that point was that there were two witnesses, but I had no notion if what they had to say would hold up to rigorous questioning. We were launching an investigation precisely to find out.
Experience has taught me that an investigation of this nature cannot be wrapped up in two or even three days. The results of one hurriedly done can only be as incomplete and as unfair as the article whose upload I had just apologized for!
The only thing clear to me was that there was smoke. Now I had to check out the fire. I didn't know whether I would find a conflagration or a bonfire. I hadn't gotten that far. It was just the second day. We still had to find people who would talk.
Finally, that investigation is done!
And as I had promised in my press conference, I would reveal the results of the investigation, whether these favored PEP or not. PEP owes it to everybody—the Gutierrez family, the Flores family, the Quizon family, and our readers.
But first, this caveat: A libel suit has been filed, tying our hands. (Although, in fact, I have not received a copy of the suit.) I had really hoped to deliver this four-part report on the PEP investigation replete with the details we have gathered. But between the time I write this and the time it takes for our lawyers to pencil in their objections, I don't know what will be left.
REPRINTING THE ARTICLE. To begin, I have made the decision to reprint the original article "Richard Gutierrez reportedly involved in a heated squabble with Michael Flores." This is so that our apology then and our investigative results now may have a common reference point.
As it is, the original article has been battered with too many wrong interpretations. Erroneous paraphrases of its content have also been spreading. Here is the article as it really is:
"Richard Gutierrez reportedly involved in a heated squabble with Michael Flores"
PEP (Philippine Entertainment Portal) received reports alleging that Zorrolead star, Richard Gutierrez, and former TGIS mainstay, Michael Flores, got into a heated altercation at around midnight, March 29, at the parking lot of the Oceana Restaurant located at the Seaside Boulevard in Pasay City.
The two actors were reportedly on their way home after attending the 40th birthday party of director Mark Reyes.
Sources claim that the squabble was marred with heated words being exchanged by both parties and a gun-toting incident. It was still unclear, however, whether the gun belongs to Richard or Michael. Epy Quizon, son of comedy king Dolphy, was also reportedly involved in the fracas.
PEP—which caught sight of Richard leaving the event together with Bubbles Paraiso and Michelle Madrigal—at press time is still investigating the said incident.
The key words and phrases here are "squabble," "altercation," "a gun-toting incident," and "fracas."
Let us try for a common understanding of these terms. According to one or more of these sources—Merriam-Webster.com, Answers.com, Wiktionary.com, Dictionary.com, The Free Dictionary.com, Longman English Dictionary, and Random House Dictionary—these are the acceptable definitions:
Squabble: To engage in a disagreeable argument, usually over a trivial matter... A noisy altercation or quarrel usually over petty matters.
Altercation: A vehement quarrel... A noisy argument; noisy quarrel... A discussion often heated, in which a difference in opinion is expressed.
Fracas: Noisy quarrel; brawl; to quarrel or fight noisily... A noisy, disorderly fight or quarrel.
Gun toting: Carry a gun.
NOTE: In no dictionary, whether print or online, does it say that gun toting means "nanutok ng baril" or "nagkatutukan." No ambiguity exists in the definition of gun toting. It comes from toting, which simply means "to carry."
NOTE: Nowhere does the PEP article say that anyone pointed a gun to somebody's head or face or body.
NOTE: The article also never said anything about who toted the gun.
Unfortunately, all sorts of interpretations and crack-pot embellishments have been inflicted on the original article by others. The biggest misinterpretation—nay, misrepresentation—of the PEP article is to have the phrase "may tutukan ng baril" attached to it.
There was none of that!
The first-known record of "gun toting" becoming "tutukan ng baril" came from Jun Lalin's Abante Tonite column, dated March 31, 2009. Jun Lalin, apart from being a tabloid columnist, is known in the entertainment industry as the Gutierrez family's erstwhile publicist, friend, and employee.
Lalin's column introduced the idea of "may tutukan ng baril" three times in his column: First, when he wrote: "Magbibigay ng official statement si Jo-Ann Maglipon ngayong 11 a.m. kaugnay ng artikulong naipost ng PEP (Philippine Entertainment Portal) na nag-away at may tutukan ng baril sa pagitan nina Richard Gutierrez at Michael Flores noong Sabado sa 40th birthday party ng Zorro director na si Mark Reyes."
Second, when he quoted actor Michael Flores saying: "Grabe naman'yung istorya at may tutukan pa ng baril, dapat mag-ingat sila sa ganoong istorya. Dahil siguraduhin nila na tama'yung sinusulat nila."
And third, when he paraphrased director Mark Reyes's quote, thus: "Hindi niya [Reyes] sukat akalain sobrang magiging memorable'yon dahil sa mainit na tsismis ng PEP na diumano ay nag-away sina Richard Gutierrez at Michael Flores at may tutukan pa umano ng baril."
Making Lalin's column doubly dangerous is that it spread the wrong notion of a gun being pointed at somebody's head, and then attributed the misstatement to PEP!
Compounding the danger is that Lalin spread the falsehood the very morning after PEP issued an apology for the article it had withdrawn.
The bottom line is: The hysteria generated by the phrase "tutukan ng baril" was not PEP's doing. It was Lalin who erroneously translated "gun toting" as "tutukan ng baril," which was again compounded by the Gutierrez family repeating the phrase in the next several days to all who would listen.
Worse, when reporters began referring to the non-existent "tutukan ng baril" as fact, neither Lalin nor the Gutierrezes admitted to the erroneous translation.
Remember that, at this point, PEP had already pulled out and buried the article. Therefore, it no longer had a reference point for a story now gone haywire.
The moment TV picked up the story, the "tutukan ng baril" scenario became even bigger.
Last March 31, TV Patrol: "Nag-sorry ngayon ang pinuno ng Philippine Entertainment Portal o PEP na si Jo-Ann Maglipon kasunod ng paglabas ng maling ulat tungkol sa engkuwentro at tutukan ng baril sa grupo nina Richard Gutierrez, Michael Flores, at iba pang mga bituin sa isang party sa Pasay noong weekend."
In the April 13 report of 24 Oras: "Twenty-five million-peso libel case ang isinampa ni Richard Gutierrez laban sa Philippine Entertainment Portal o PEP. Nag-ugat ito sa artikulo ng PEP na nagkaroon ng alitan sina Richard Gutierrez at Michael Flores sa parking lot ng venue ng birthday party ni direk Mark Reyes noong March 29 na nauwi raw sa tutukan ng baril."
A small note: Nobody ever asked PEP if we mentioned "tutukan ng baril" in the article that was pulled down. Even veteran reporters just assumed we did. I repeat: we did not.