Despite girl’s outburst, Roberto’s motion for mistrial denied

U.S. District Court for the NMI Chief Judge Ramona V. Manglona denied yesterday Raymond B. Roberto’s motion for a mistrial and let one of the three alleged victims resume her testimony despite an outburst in court on Tuesday.

After reminding the 16-year-old girl to maintain respect and order in court and giving instructions to the jurors on what constitutes evidence or not, Manglona directed Roberto’s lead counsel David J. Lujan to continue questioning the girl yesterday afternoon.

Lujan’s cross-examination lasted until late afternoon and will continue today, Thursday. He began his cross-examination on the girl on Monday.

Drama unfolded Tuesday shortly before noon in Roberto’s trial when the girl became upset at a comment made by Lujan during cross-examination. She cursed at Lujan, threw a glass of water at him, and berated the prosecutors. The commotion prompted Manglona to order a recess and instruct the lawyers to reconvene at 9am yesterday. She instructed the jurors to return yesterday at 1:30pm.

In denying Roberto’s motion for a mistrial yesterday, Manglona said the girl’s direct threat against Lujan does not prejudice Roberto. Manglona said it’s up to the jury to assess and decide on the girl’s outburst and violent act.

If there is prejudice, Manglona said it is actually against the U.S. government, but the prosecution wants the trial to proceed.

The outburst also does not present new facts for the jury, Manglona said.

In arguing Roberto’s motion for a new trial, Lujan said the girl threw water at him and threatened to kill him or cut his head.

Lujan credited Federal Bureau of Investigation special agent Haejun Park for quickly standing up to calm down the alleged victim during her outburst. Despite this, the girl refused to calm down, Lujan said, turning her attention to Park and cursing Assistant U.S. Attorney Rami S. Badawy and U.S. Attorney for the Districts of Guam and NMI Alicia Limtiaco.

Lujan said the girl’s mother also created an outburst with a tirade of her own.

He said the incident created a breach of fundamental fairness, especially to the defense, and any continuation of the cross-examination will not be perceived well by the jury due to the girl’s and her mother’s outburst.

Lujan said some of the jurors likely felt for the girl and their sympathy will go against Roberto and the defense.

“We have a witness who showed how tough she is. The witness is bent on proving to anyone that she’s a tough girl,” Lujan said.

He said there’s no way they can proceed with the trial and asked the court to declare a mistrial and set a new trial date.

In opposing the motion, Badawy said the real issue is whether the girl and her mother’s outburst makes the jury impartial. Citing a 9th Circuit ruling, Badawy said the U.S. government’s position is that it does not.

He said the court could just instruct the jury to disregard the statements.

Badawy noted that the girl’s outburst was directed at the prosecutors as well.

He said the court can also conduct voir dire to determine whether the outburst affected the jurors. Through voir dire a lawyer can challenge a juror for cause if that person says or otherwise expresses bias against the attorney’s case.

Badawy said a mistrial is unnecessary.

Badawy said it is clear from what happened that Lujan’s question to the girl—that she likes older men—was inappropriate.

“How’s that relevant? It is strictly prohibited under Rule 12 that prevents harassment of victims,” he said.

Badawy said the statement was wholly inappropriate and should not have been allowed as it was designed to provoke the witness.

He said Roberto should not benefit on that inappropriate question.

Lujan agreed that his question provoked the outburst. After hearing the outburst, members of the jury obviously are human and had to be affected too, he said.

Lujan said the witness made it clear that she does not want to testify.

At this point, Manglona interrupted Lujan, saying that the witness had been testifying since Friday.

Lujan said the witness has apparently been coached. “You can’t ignore what the witness said and she blamed the government. She does not like to testify,” Lujan stated. “We have a witness on ‘ice.’”

After listening to the arguments, Manglona ordered a recess to review the case law that the prosecution presented to support a denial of the motion for mistrial.

Before the recess, Badawy clarified what he described as Lujan’s mischaracterization of the alleged victim being on “ice.”

“She’s not on ‘ice,’” he stressed.

After a few minutes, Manglona announced her decision to deny the call for a mistrial.

Manglona then asked if the girl can resume her testimony at 1:30pm that afternoon.

Badawy said the girl is willing to continue her testimony on Thursday morning, but that they will follow up whether she could make it at 1:30pm yesterday.

When the girl took the witness stand yesterday, Manglona asked the girl if she could promise not to resort to any violent acts in the courtroom.

The girl said, “Yes.”

Manglona then gave instructions to the jurors regarding the girl’s outburst.

The girl appeared calm throughout Lujan’s cross-examination. She was holding a stuffed toy and kept swinging her chair throughout her testimony.

In response to Lujan’s questions, the girl mostly replied that she does not recall some of the details she stated in her testimony in court during direct examination about her interviews by police detective Melissa Bauleong and FBI special agents.

She also stated that some of the details in Bauleong’s report were false, but not with the FBI agents’ reports.

Roberto, former acting Division of Fish and Wildlife director, is on trial for three counts of enticing three minors to engage in prostitution and one count of witness tampering.