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The rape of Pepsi Paloma

By: Rodel Rodis - @inquirerdotnet
[Link] 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 shows 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:
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at ngayon di pa rin alam
kung bat tayo nandito
pwede bang itigil muna
ang pagikot ng mundo

umiyak ang umaga

anong sinulat ni enteng at joey dyan
sa gintong salamin
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di ko na mabasa
pagkat merong nagbura ahhh
(And we still dont know why were here, please stop the turning of the world, the
morning cried, what did enteng and joey write in the golden mirror I couldnt 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 Pepsis
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
DHorsey (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 Pepsis 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 longe

Read more: [Link]

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