The administrator of the website which shared the viral Ang Totoong Narco List (“The Real Narco List”) videos pleaded not guilty today to charges of inciting sedition.
Rodel Jayme, the administrator of the now inaccessible website Metrobalita.net, pleaded not guilty today before the Parañaque Regional Trial Court (RTC) Branch 258, reported GMA News.
The Department of Justice (DOJ) filed the case against Jayme because it was his website which allegedly first published the controversial videos. In the videos, a hooded man named “Bikoy” alleges that the president’s son, Paolo Duterte, son-in-law Manases Carpio, and incoming senator Christopher “Bong” Go have received millions of pesos from drug syndicates.
Jayme admitted that he created the website Metrobalita.net, but said it wasn’t him who uploaded the videos, reported ABS-CBN News. He said that two supporters of the opposition Liberal Party, named “Maru Nguyen” and “Maru Xie,” asked him to create the website. He said he was willing to identify the others who were allegedly responsible for uploading the videos; the National Bureau of Investigation said they might ask Jayme to become a state witness.
After entering his plea, Jayme was transferred from the NBI to the Parañaque City Jail, reported The Philippine Daily Inquirer.
On May 6, a man named Peter Advincula surfaced and said he was the real-life Bikoy. He asked for free legal aid from the Integrated Bar of the Philippines’ (IBP) because he wanted to file a case against Go, Duterte, and Carpio but the IBP refused to help him.
Advincula hasn’t been charged in connection with the viral videos but a fraud complaint was filed against him by a businessman at the DOJ earlier this month for allegedly failing to pay the winners of a beauty pageant which the former organized.
