Court suspends proceedings in cyber libel case vs 8chan founder

A Pasig court has suspended proceedings in a cyber libel case against the founder of 8chan, an online message board linked to three mass shootings abroad.

The Pasig Regional Trial Court Branch 158 granted Fredrick Brennan's motion to defer proceedings while his petition appealing his indictment is pending at the Department of Justice (DOJ), his lawyer said Friday.

The RTC 158 of Pasig City granted our Motion to Defer Proceedings in Fredrick Brennan libel case and chose to wait for the outcome of our Petition for Review at the DOJ. The Court may dismiss the case if the DOJ will grant our Appeal @HW_BEAT_THAT @Abogado_PH

— AlexanderAcain (@AlexanderAcain) March 6, 2020

"The court may dismiss the case if the DOJ will grant our appeal," Brennan's lawyer, Alexander Acain, Jr., said on Twitter.

Acain told GMA News Online they have not received word from the DOJ regarding their petition for review, which they filed last February 26.

Brennan was recently ordered arrested on cyber libel charges for tweeting that  James Arthur "Jim" Watkins, 8chan's current owner, was "going senile" and that the message board's administrators were "terrible incompetent people."

The court recommended bail of P10,000. Though a Philippine permanent resident visa holder, Brennan is currently in the United States.

Acain said he would recommend for his client to return and face the case.

In his DOJ appeal, Brennan, through his lawyer, argued that he was "not motivated by malice when he posted the controversial tweets."

"Respondent was merely exercising his civic duty to inform the public about the people behind 8Chan and the dangers of operating a website that hosted hate speech and white nationalist creed because it has already claimed the lives of many innocent people in the United States and in New Zealand as well," his petition for review states.

Watkins, who is based in the Philippines, owns a site that was allegedly used by a gunman to post a statement referring to his deadly attack in El Paso, Texas hours later as "a response to the Hispanic invasion of Texas."

Reports say 8chan, now called 8kun, was also used by the shooter who killed 51 people in two mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand in March 2019, supposedly providing inspiration for a shooting a month later at a synagogue in Poway, California.—AOL, GMA News