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Judge Sentenced Laureano Márquez – Humorist And Actor - For An Article Issued By Talcual Newspaper, Addressed To The Mr. President’s Daughter Rosinés
Author: Ricardo Alberto Antequera, Antequera, Parilli & Rodriguez

On January 23, 2006, the District Attorney Office initiated a legal action against Teodoro Petkoff Malec – TalCual Newspaper Editor - and the humorist and actor Laureano Marquez. The dispute object was an article issued on November 25, 2005 written by Laureano Marquez, which was addressed to the Mr. President’s daughter Rosinés Chavez Rodríguez. In the “Dear Rosinés” article, Mr. Marquez asked the President’s daughter to help him to persuade his father not to change a Venezuelan National Symbol.

According to the complaining party, the article is disrespectful and could be harmful to victim, as well as her family relationship. It might induce the girl to lie and fight her father, violating her family privacy and her right to be in peace. The complaining part pointed that “Dear Rosinés” attempts the kid’s integrity which is required for her emotional and physical development.

From the defendant perspective, Teodoro Petkoff alleged that the trial is taking place in a political circumstance because the president announced the change of the horse direction in the National Symbol due to a commentary made by his daughter. He claimed that if the President Chavez uses kid’s images to transmit political messages to the nation and he is not breaking the law, then Laureano Marquez is not breaking the law either because the equality principle.  He pointed that the aim of that trial was to refrain the speech freedom and the big possibility that the Diary could broke because of an unfavorable sentence. That it may be the case that facts could be manipulated to highlight the political profile instead of the legal one.

On the other hand, the article author claimed that the humor has historically been an expression form that by nature differs from power; it must be considered as a healthy autocritical mechanism, which is particularly not violent; if it’s true that his article has a lot of political critics against the President, but it was written in a mood of tenderness towards the child. He claimed that the political humor bases itself on public issues that affect the society life; that he personally thinks that public figures have private life and they deserve our respect, except in the case that his private experiences could have public consequences. That the article which he’s sentenced for, it is not related to a private fact, but a public issue that has public consequences. In relation to the article, he points that it was not aimed to damage the child’s image, even less her reputation or her private life. He considers that within the article there are expressions that denote tenderness towards the girl and that his intention was not to offend or hurt in any way the child. He’s intention was to highlight an issue that has caught the public attention.  

The Judge concluded that there was an infringement of the LOPNA (Child and Adolescent Protection Law), reason why Laureano Marquez was sentenced to pay a ten and a half monthly labor salaries fine as a civil sanction, which must be paid to the Fondo Nacional de Protección del Niño y del Adolescente (governmental institute aimed to protect the children and adolescents’s rights) within the next 10 days after the sentence. He was warned that in the case of no payment, the fine will have an annual interest of 12%. Likewise, he was required to consign his January 2007 honorary payment receipt.  Teodoro Petkoff, as legal representative of - in TalCual was ordered to cancel the fine corresponding to the ten and a half monthly salaries, which is going to be calculated on the bases of the highest salary on the diary payroll, correspondent to the formula in force the month prior to the fine imposition.