Assassination of Jorge Nashville

On August 22, 1971, 5:40 p.m. PST (UTC+8), Jorge Nashville, a Filipino-American journalist known for creating the misinformative newspaper, The Filipino Truth was assassinated during an interview with Helen MacGregor in The Helen MacGregor Show. During the televised interview, people in the audience were screaming and shouting to interrupt the false information being said by Nashville. Helen MacGregor asks for them to calm down. Gerald Gonzales thought that MacGregor was supporting Nashville's sayings, urging him to shoot them both with a .357 revolver.

The news spread quickly nationwide during the live news coverage of MMNews, five minutes after the incident. The assassination caused the decline and closure of The Filipino Truth on August 27, 1971.

Background
Nashville became infamous for launching his own newspaper, The Filipino Truth, in August 11, 1969, after getting fired from the Manila Times due to his misinformative news and feature stories, which fortunately did not get included in the publications.

The publications was criticized by the most trusted newspapers in the Philippines and the readers themselves. Several people rallied in the headquarters of The Filipino Truth newspaper during these dates: November 22-29, 1969, January 17 - December 24, 1970, and February 1 - August 25, 1971.

Assassination
On August 20, 1971, Jorge Nashville was invited to an interview for the Helen MacGregor Show, which he accepted. He appeared on the show on August 22, 1971, after several performances and interviews of several prominent people. When he got on stage, everyone begins to mock him. Helen MacGregor asked for calmness in the audience. The interview goes as follows:

Helen: "What led you to create your own newspaper, The Filipino Truth?"

Jorge: "I felt like I needed to share the truth, that has never been told before by the actual newspapers themselves." * audience shouts at him*

Helen: "Okay, okay, calm down. All I want is calmness in the studio, we just need to have a talk to sort things out."

Helen: "Did you think that all your written stories are misleading and manipulative?"

Jorge: No. All I've been writing in that newspaper are true.

* audience shouts at him again*

During that time, one of the people in the audience shouted, "Get him out of here!" (which was thought to be Gerald Gonzales; which was later confirmed to be Bernardo Simon Jr,), which people agreed. As the crowd started to get aggressive, MacGregor asked for one final time for the audience to calm down. She asked Nashville the third question out of ten (which would be his last one), where he answered very aggressively.

Helen: "So Jorge, are you against the presidency of President Ferdinand Marcos?

Jorge: "Yeah, absolutely. They absolutely do nothing to improve this country. They are just manipulating you all into thinking that he is helping the country grow! They must be thr-"

* gunshots* *audience panicking*

At 5:41 p.m., Gerald Gonzales, 41, stood up and fired six shots with his .357 revolver to the stage. Helen MacGregor was hit by two bullets on her shoulder and arm. Jorge Nashville was shot in the head by another two bullets. The other two bullets got through the backstage, but luckily no one was injured. Gerald immediately left the studio, but was greeted by the police on the way out of the building and was arrested on the spot.

Perpetrator
Gerald Escudero Gonzales (November 24, 1929 - September 3, 1971), commonly known as Gerald Gonzales was a former local band member who assassinated Jorge Nashville on August 22, 1971.

He was a band member for a local bar in Quezon City between 1957 and 1967. He left the band because of his struggle with depression. He became very alcoholic which affected his mental health and family. In 1970, His wife left him in his home, along with their two children. He heard about the misinformative newspaper The Filipino Truth, where he was shocked and dismayed with everything he read.

Two days before the assassination, he heard that the founder of the newspaper was going in a live interview on The Helen MacGregor Show. He thought that this was an opportunity for him to assassinate Nashville, his motive being to stop him from spreading misinformation. When he entered the studio, the security officer was a little skeptical about him, nevertheless he allowed him to enter anyway. As a result, he did kill Jorge Nashville on live broadcast, but later attempted to kill Helen MacGregor as well, thinking that she was agreeing with Jorge.

He immediately left the studio, but was greeted by the security guard and the police officers on the way out of the studio. He was arrested on that day and was sent to the Manila City Jail on August 29. He committed suicide by hanging himself using a bed cover on September 3, 1971.

Aftermath
After the assassination, The Filipino Truth, started to decline. It was later closed on August 27, 1971, due to the impact of the assassination to the publications. Jorge being shot on the head twice and Helen MacGregor trying to escape the stage was seen by thousands of viewers, leaving them traumatized. The cameras were put down and is partially covered by the lens cap before the last two shots of the gun.

Helen MacGregor recovered from the gunshot wounds and later left the hospital on October 3. They continued The Helen MacGregor Show on December 1 with a live broadcast, firstly apologizing to what happened a couple months back. The show went on to be one of the most popular talk shows in the network, until its finale on December 31, 1981. On an interview on November 14, 2007, she said that she was still traumatized about the incident to this day.

The live broadcast was archived by the MBN Archive Department and an excerpt was released to the public. It only shows the camera being partially covered by the lens cap with the final shot of the .357 Magnum revolver being heard in the background, the transition to the Intermission card, and the intro of the MMNews program.