Tito Sotto denies whitewashing Pepsi Paloma rape case

By: Totel V. de Jesus

INQUIRER.net / 10:36 PM March 03, 2016

Senator Vicente “Tito” Sotto III. INQUIRER file

After 34 years, incumbent Senator Vicente “Tito” Sotto III denied involvement in whitewashing
the controversial Pepsi Paloma rape case.

BACKSTORY: The rape of Pepsi Paloma

“Hindi totoo ‘yan. Gimik yan ni Rey dela Cruz. (That wasn’t true. That was the gimmick of Rey
dela Cruz.),” Sotto said in a radio interview on Thursday.

Dela Cruz was talent manager of sexy actress Pepsi Paloma. An optometrist by profession, Dela
Cruz became famous for managing  sexy actresses in the 1980s dubbed the Softdrinks Beauties,
namely Coca Nicolas, Sarsi Emmanuel and Paloma.

In 1982, Paloma was allegedly drugged and gang raped by comedians Vic Sotto, Joey de Leon
and Richie D’ Horsie
Vic, whose real name is Marvic Sotto, is a younger brother of Tito.
Paloma died in 1985 in what was ruled out as suicide. She reportedly hang herself due to
depression because of “monetary problems.” But there were speculations that she was murdered
to silence her further in pursuing the alleged rape case against the comedians.
READ: Was Pepsi Paloma murdered?
Sotto, though he wasn’t involved in the alleged rape, was dragged into the controversy when he
allegedly used his position in government to influence the court’s decision.
“It [alleged rape] happened in 1982. Eh 1988 ako naging Vice Mayor,” he told anchor Alvin
Elchico on DZMM Teleradyo.
Sotto served as Vice Mayor of Quezon City before he was elected senator in 1992.
“In fact, Vic and Joey filed libel case against Rey dela Cruz. And there were reports in
newspapers that time quoting Paloma and she said it’s not true,” Sotto said in Filipino.
“Kaya yang mga kumakalat sa Facebook, hindi totoo yan. Paninira lang mga yan. (Those
[articles] circulating on Facebook, they’re false. They’re meant to malign me),” he added.
Running for another term, Sotto maintains the top senatorial spot in recent surveys. TVJ

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The rape of Pepsi Paloma
By: Rodel Rodis - @inquirerdotnet
INQUIRER.net US Bureau / 04:32 PM March 05, 2014

The Eraserheads PHOTO/PHILIPPINE DAILY INQUIRER

We were eating lunch at a Daly City home and watching “Eat Bulaga!”, the popular noontime
variety show on GMA TV, when someone commented that he read on Facebook that two of the
show’s hosts, Vic Sotto and Joey de Leon, were involved in the gang rape of a young Filipino
American actress named Pepsi Paloma in 1982.
Three young Filipino kids, all recent immigrants, joined in the conversation and said that they
also heard of the Pepsi Paloma rape case. I expressed surprise because it occurred long before
any of them were born. They explained that they learned of the rape from the song “Spolarium”
composed and performed by the Eraserheads, their favorite Filipino rock band.
When I Googled the lyrics of “Spolarium” by the Eraserheads, I found these words:

at ngayon di pa rin alam

kung ba’t tayo nandito

pwede bang itigil muna
ang pagikot ng mundo
 
umiyak ang umaga
anong sinulat ni enteng at joey dyan
sa gintong salamin

di ko na mabasa
pagkat merong nagbura ahhh…
(And we still don’t know why we’re here, please stop the turning of the world, the morning
cried, what did enteng and joey write in the golden mirror I couldn’t read because someone
erased it).

Senate Majority Leader Vicente Sotto III. INQUIRER file photo

According to these diehard fans of the Eraserheads, “enteng” is  Vic Sotto and “joey” is Joey de
Leon and the something that was erased was their criminal record. The meaning of the lyrics of
this song, the kids shared, has been a popular subject of discussion in Manila universities as well
as in the social media.

When I Googled “Pepsi Paloma”, I saw the link to the video that had been downloaded on
Facebook by as many as 66,000 viewers The “Eat Bulaga – Pepsi Paloma story” reported the
tragic tale of Delia Smith, the eldest daughter of Lydia Duenas, a native of Borac, Northern
Samar, and Kenneth Smith, an American letter carrier who deserted his family when his four
children were still young.
When Delia was barely 13, her mother introduced her to talent manager Rey dela Cruz who
changed her name to “Pepsi Paloma” to join his stable of other “soft drink” beauties which
included Sarsi Emmanuel and Cola Nicolas. Dela Cruz secured Pepsi’s starring role in her first
movie, a “bold” feature called Brown Emmanuelle in 1981.

Less than a year later, according to her account, while promoting one of her movies, Pepsi met
the three comedian hosts of Eat Bulaga – Vic Sotto, Joey de Leon and Richie D’Horsey (Richie
Reyes). The three men took her out to a bar, drugged her, and then gang raped her in a hotel
room. (Because she was only 14 at the time, these comedians were pedophile rapists.)

To prosecute a crime in the Philippines, you cannot just rely on government prosecutors, you
have to hire a private prosecutor otherwise the case will be dismissed for lack of prosecution. For
this job, Pepsi sought the help of then Defense Secretary Juan Ponce Enrile who referred her to
the senior partner in the ACCRA law office, Atty.  Rene Cayetano, the father of Sen. Pia
Cayetano and Sen. Alan Peter Cayetano, who offered his pro bono services to Pepsi.

If convicted of the rape charge, the three comedians faced the death penalty, a sentence that was
meted out previously in 1967 to the four rapists of movie star Maggie dela Riva. Three of the
men were executed in 1972 on live TV while the fourth escaped the electric chair by dying in
prison.

To prevent the same fate from befalling his younger brother, Sen. Tito Sotto quickly went to see
Pepsi Paloma while she was still securing the services of Atty. Cayetano. According to her
account of this visit, Sen. Sotto “coerced” her into signing an “Affidavit of Desistance” to drop
the rape complaint against his brother and his cohorts.

[But how could that affidavit be legal when she was only 14 when she signed it and she did so
without the presence of her attorney?  But this happened in 1982 during martial law and the
Sottos were said to be favored by the Marcos dictatorship.]

How was she coerced? In her November 3, 2012 column in the Philippine Daily Inquirer, Rina
Jimenez David described this incident as follows: “Paloma eventually dropped the charges after
she was allegedly visited by one of the trio who said he had only talked with her, but only after
placing a pistol on the table in front of her.”

As a result of Pepsi’s signed affidavit of desistance, no criminal charges were filed against the
three comedian rapists even after they went down on their knees on their show “Eat Bulaga!” and
asked forgiveness from Pepsi Paloma for raping her when she was only 14.

Three years after her rape, on May 31, 1985, Pepsi was found dead in her apartment with a rope
looped around her neck. The police concluded that it was a suicide caused by “monetary
problems” and this was the official story that appeared in the headlines of the newspapers.

But her manager, Babette Corcuerra, disputed the press account. “She was earning well and was
fully booked for dancing performances. She just finished the Pepsi Paloma Show at the Bughaw
and 10 other beerhouses,” Corcuerra said, and she had three film offers lined up, she added.
It just did not add up, Corcuerra said. “She was looking forward to celebrating her 18th birthday
next year. She made me promise to throw a big party for her at a hotel because it would be her
debut,” Corcuerra told the Times Journal.

Was she murdered? Before he passed away, in an interview on ABS-CBN that was not aired,
self-confessed hitman Kit Mateo intimated as much.

“Eat Bulaga!” is now entering its 35th year as the longest-running noontime variety on air
program in the history of television, making millionaires of its comedic stars.
Sen. Tito Sotto is still in the Philippine Senate serving as the proud champion of the Holy Roman
Catholic Church in his staunch opposition to the Reproductive Health Act and to all forms of
contraception.

Pepsi Paloma would have celebrated her 47th birthday this year.
(Send comments to Rodel50@gmail.com or mail them to the Law Offices of Rodel Rodis at 2429
Ocean Avenue, San Francisco, CA 94127 or call 415.334.7800).

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Was Pepsi Paloma murdered?
By: Rodel Rodis - @inquirerdotnet
INQUIRER.net US Bureau / 12:45 AM March 15, 2014

Pepsi Paloma, a Filipino American who was born Delia Duenas Smith, starred in her first movie,
Brown Emmanuelle, when she was only 14. While promoting the movie several months later, she
was gang raped by three well-known Philippine TV personalities. Three years later, after starring
in 9 movies when she was still only 17, she committed suicide. Or did she?
One of the few dailies allowed to publish during the martial law regime, the Times Journal on
June 1, 1985 carried the banner headline, “Pepsi Paloma Kills Self by Hanging.” The front page
news article reported that the day before, Pepsi Paloma’s “limp body, clad only in a flimsy yellow
night gown, was found hanging inside a closet from a three-inch thick and 36-inch long cotton
sash.”

Pfc. Willy Borgonia, the officer in charge of the Quezon City police investigation at the scene,
told reporters that his “suicide” conclusion was based on the presence of the cotton sash around
the victim’s neck and the discovery of her personal diary which indicated that she was depressed
because of “monetary problems.”

There is no record that the Quezon City police checked for any fingerprints around the closet to
determine if there was any foul play involved. There was no report of the presence of any stool
or box inside the closet to provide some indication of how the victim managed to hang herself.
There was also no attempt to verify if the handwriting of the diary actually belonged to Pepsi
Paloma.
It was an open and shut case as far as Private First Class Willy Borgonia was concerned so there
was no need to bother with forensic crime scene investigation. Except that Pepsi’s manager,
Babette Corcuerra, disputed the official police explanation of “monetary problems” as the cause
of her alleged suicide.
“She was earning well and was fully booked for dancing performances. She just finished the
Pepsi Paloma Show at the Bughaw and 10 other beerhouses” which paid her at least 2500 pesos
per performance (a large sum in 1985) and she had three film offers lined up, Corcuerra said.

Even though she was only 17, Pepsi had adopted a 4 month old son whom she was reportedly
very close to. She wanted to provide for this child what she did not have. From all indications,
Pepsi Paloma was a remarkably responsible young girl, not the type who would just loop a sash
around her neck and just kill herself.
Corcuerra told the Times Journal that Pepsi was so looking forward to celebrating her 18th
birthday the next year. “She even made me promise to throw a big party for her at a hotel
because it would be her debut,” Corcuerra added.
One reader recalls attending the funeral wake of Pepsi Paloma when he was only 9 years old and
noticing visible marks around her neck which indicated to him that she was “strangled”. Even a 9
year old boy knew then that a cotton sash could not have caused the marks he saw around her
neck.
A friend used to joke that it was a waste of time to use metal detectors on Filipinos traveling to
the US because Filipinos do not blow themselves up in planes.“It’s not in the DNA of Filipinos
to commit suicide,” he observed. Even Filipino Muslim jihadists in the Philippines detonate
bombs from a distance rather than blow themselves up“, he added.

Generally, only those suffering from severe mental depressions are likely to commit suicide and
there was no indication that Pepsi Paloma was experiencing bouts of clinical depression that
would cause her to end her life.
So if she did not commit suicide, was she murdered?
Pepsi Paloma was only 14 years old when she and another actress named Guada Guarin reported
that they were drugged in a bar and brought to a room at the Sulo Hotel in Quezon City where
they were “gang raped” by Joey De Leon, Vic Sotto and Richie D’Horsie, the comedian hosts of
the popular TV show “Eat Bulaga!”
Pepsi Paloma reported her gang rape to her mother who contacted the police authorities where it
made the headlines of the dailies. But the police would not file criminal charges against the
rapists unless and until Pepsi Paloma hired a private prosecutor to pursue the criminal case. Pepsi
sought the help of then Defense Secretary Juan Ponce Enrile who referred her to Rene Cayetano,
the lead attorney of the ACCRA law offices, who agreed to represent Paloma for free.
But while Cayetano was preparing to file the formal complaint with the police authorities, Pepsi
Paloma was suddenly reported missing. In 1982 martial law Philippines, no one got abducted or
“salvaged” unless it was done by the Metrocom Intelligence Security Group (MISG) led by
notorious human rights violators Col. Rolando Abadilla and Capt. Panfilo Lacson and they did
not abduct Pepsi Paloma. Assigned the task of finding Pepsi Paloma, Abadilla and Lacson knew
exactly where to find Pepsi Paloma.
They tracked down Bienvenido Mendoza known infamously as “Ben Ulo”and their suspicion
proved accurate when they found Pepsi Paloma held captive by Ben Ulo. They knew he was the
likely suspect because he was known as the main enforcer of the Castelo clan which is on the
maternal side of the Sotto family.
Ben Ulo had been sentenced to life imprisonment for the June 15, 1953 murder of Manuel P.
Monroy who was a prosecution witness against then Secretary of National Defense Oscar
Castelo (the uncle of Vic and Tito Sotto). The Philippine Supreme Court affirmed his murder
conviction on May 30, 1964 (G.R. No. L-10774) but it is not certain how much time he actually
spent in prison.
Ben Ulo readily confessed to Col. Abadilla that he was an “accomplice of the Castelos”. Despite
his arrest and confession, however, there is no record that Ben Ulo was ever charged with any
crime connected with the abduction of Pepsi Paloma.
After her rescue, Pepsi reported that Tito Sotto visited her and “coerced” her (by reportedly
placing a pistol on the table in front of her) into signing an “affidavit of desistance” for her not to
press rape charges against Sotto’s brother and his cohorts.
In exchange for the dismissal of the rape charges, Joey De Leon, Vic Sotto and Richie D’Horsie
issued a public apology to Pepsi Paloma which was published in the People’s Journal on
October13. 1982:
“We hope that you will not allow the error we have committed against you to stand as a
stumbling block to that future which we all look forward to. We therefore ask you to find it
in your heart to pardon us for the wrong which we have done against you.”
In the Philippines, people do not commit crimes, they only commit “errors”. It was simply an
“error” for Joey, Vic and Richie to drug a 14-year old minor and then gang rape her.
If this “error” had occurred in the US, the perpetrators would have been charged and sentenced to
the maximum allowed by law and that wouldn’t even be their worst fate. While in prison, they
would likely be “gang raped” or even killed by convicts who rate child molesters and child
rapists the lowest of the low, the most depraved of the depraved. If they somehow managed to
survive their incarceration, they would be required to register as “sex offenders” in every place
they move to for the rest of their sorry lives.
If this “error” had occurred in India, well it actually did. On December 16, 2012, in New Delhi, a
23-year old female intern was beaten and gang raped by five men. The woman later died from
the beating in a case that ignited widespread protests all over India. The perpetrators were
arrested and charged with sexual assault and murder. One of them hung himself while in police
custody; the rest went to trial and were found guilty and sentenced to death by hanging.
[Coincidentally, this week the Delhi High Court affirmed their death sentences.]

But there were no protests in the Philippines against the gang rape of Pepsi Paloma in 1982 and
no calls for an independent investigation of the mysterious circumstances surrounding her death
in 1985. No charges were ever filed against any of her rapists or abductors.
Instead, 57-year old Vic Sotto is the reigning box-office king of Philippine movies and has been
linked romantically to a succession of beautiful actresses from Dina Bonnevie and Pia Guanio to
Pauline Luna.
Joey de Leon was 36 years old when he participated in the gang rape of 14 year old Pepsi
Paloma, who was young enough to be his daughter.
There were very few commentaries about the rape of Pepsi Paloma at the time but one was found
by former Sen. Heherson Alvarez who posted it on his blog: “Tito Sotto’s talent in politics was
first tested in October 1982 when he spearheaded the settlement for the rape case filed by sexy
stars Pepsi Paloma and Guada Guarin against Tito’s younger brother Vic Sotto and his “Eat
Bulaga” co-hosts Joey de Leon and Richie D’Horsie.” (Talk Show, Fundy C. Soriano).”
Vicente “Tito” Castelo Sotto parlayed his “talent in politics” into a successful run for Vice Mayor
of Quezon City in 1988 followed by two successive terms in the Philippine Senate from 1992 to
2004 and then another senate election in 2010 and possible reelection 2016.
Would Tito Sotto have enjoyed his political success and Vic Sotto and Joey de Leon their
commercial success if Pepsi Paloma had still been alive to serve as a constant reminder to the
public about her gang rape when she was just 14? Who knows?
When my article http://globalnation.inquirer.net/99861/the-rape-of-pepsi-paloma was
published in the Inquirer online edition on March 5, 2014, I expected some response from the
TVJ principals. But none of them responded to deny any of the assertions of the article although
a number of their rabid fans rose to their defense by wildly speculating on what my motivation
may be for bringing up the issue now.
To them, I quote Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.: “The arc of the moral universe may be long but it
bends towards justice.”
One fan of Tito, Vic and Joey even used the name “Jim Paredes” to defend his idols. The real Jim
Paredes immediately posted on his Facebook page that an impostor had maliciously used his
name to express a sentiment he did not share. The real Jim Paredes wrote: “I also wish to say that
like many people, I believe Pepsi Paloma did not get justice.”
So far, over 128,000 people have expressed a similar sentiment and downloaded and shared my
Pepsi Paloma article on their Facebook pages. It has officially gone viral. Perhaps it will spur a
movement to boycott Eat Bulaga and the show’s advertisers to finally retire it after 35 long
years. Perhaps people will now openly talk about what happened to Pepsi Paloma.
There was no social media and no free press in the Philippines in 1982 when a 14 year old minor
was gang raped nor in 1985 when a 17 year old girl with a 4 month old adopted son committed
“suicide”. There is no excuse for silence now, for perpetuating the culture of impunity.
Justice for Pepsi Paloma.
(Send comments to Rodel50@gmail.com or mail them to the Law Offices of Rodel Rodis at 2429
Ocean Avenue, San Francisco, CA 94127 or call 415.334.7800).

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