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Bank counsel: Mayor Flores’ claim for $200K long-term investment lacks common sense
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Posted on Dec 11 2011
Saipan Mayor Donald G. Flores’ claim that he purchased Certificate of Deposit in the amount of $200,000 in 1993 from the now defunct Union Bank as a long-term investment defies common sense, according to a lawyer for Union Bank of California.
Attorney Elyze McDonald Iriarte, counsel for Union Bank of California (UBC), said for that long-term investment, Flores purchased a certificate of deposit that matured in a very short 32 days, with interest “payable at maturity” and made no demand for 15 years.
Flores also admits having “common knowledge” that the First Hawaiian Bank moved into the same building Union Bank had occupied, meaning that he was aware Union Bank no longer operated in Saipan after 2011, said Iriarte in UBC’s reply in support of First Hawaiian Bank’s motion to dismiss Flores’ lawsuit.
“If plaintiff (Flores) intended a long-term investment, making a demand on a one-month CD 15 years after it matured lacks common sense,” the lawyer said.
Moreover, Iriarte said, Flores’ “reliance in the safety of his CD record…after the sale of Union Bank” is unreasonable and implausible given that he was aware of the sale, and his CD had matured eight years prior to the sale.
Iriarte said all Flores’ claims must be dismissed on this basis.
Flores, through counsel Juan T. Lizama, is suing UCB and First Hawaiian Bank.
Lizama stated in the complaint that Flores purchased the CD in the principal amount of $200,000 that was issued in his name by the Saipan Branch of Union Bank on Sept. 10, 1993.
Lizama said his client kept the issued certificate with the intent of eventually redeeming it.
Lizama said that on Nov. 15, 2001, Union Bank sold all assets and liabilities of its Saipan branch office to FHB.
UCB joined the FHB’s motion to dismiss Flores’ lawsuit.
In opposing the motion to dismiss, Flores, through Lizama, asserted that the record of his Time Certificate of Deposit in the amount of $200,000 could not have disappeared without any negligence or intentional destruction of it.
Flores said the shredding of documents is extremely suspect.
FHB has denied that it received Flores’ $200,000.
