Manila names as defendants 2 former DOC commissioners

Reynaldo A. Manila, an inmate who claimed that he may be losing his vision due to the negligence of the Department of Corrections, has filed an amended complaint in federal court naming as defendants two former DOC commissioners and a former acting DOC commissioner.

In his handwritten amended complaint he filed without a lawyer last Monday, Manila named as defendants former DOC commissioners Robert Guerrero and Georgia M. Cabrera, and former acting DOC commissioner Jose K. Pangelinan.

Manila filed the amended complaint following U.S. District Court for the NMI Chief Judge Ramona V. Manglona’s recent order that found his complaint not frivolous.

In that order, Manglona said Manila’s complaint fails to identify by name the persons or entities against whom he is complaining. The judge instructed Manila to amend his complaint by naming a defendant or defendants.

Manila has sought help from the District Court after his eye surgery at the Commonwealth Health Center last September was allegedly unsuccessful and that he is worried he is losing his vision.

Manila said the actions and inactions of DOC have resulted in his suffering from the unnecessary and wanton infliction of pain.

He said DOC officials’ willful indifference to his medical issues has caused his prolonged physical pain.

Manila said his pain/suffering is exacerbated by mental anguish of knowing that he may go blind on his left eye, a life-long handicap or permanent loss.

He said the defendants denied and delayed his medical treatment.

Manila said a medical officer told him that according to then-DOC commissioner Cabrera his medical condition was not “life-threatening.”

According to court documents, Manila wrote Manglona last Dec. 6 explaining his eye problem and begging for assistance as he cannot afford to pay a lawyer to represent him.

In 2015, the CNMI Board of Parole voted to commute the 60-year prison sentence slapped on Manila, who was convicted in 2002 for the death of his six-month-old goddaughter.

Manila, now, 56 years old, has been serving 17 years of the 60-year prison term.

In 2016, Gov. Ralph DLG Torres decided against commutation at the advice of the Office of the Attorney General and the Department of Public Safety.

Then-Superior Court associate judge Virginia Sablan-Onerheim sentenced Manila in June 2002 to 60 years in prison for second-degree murder over the death of the baby.

The baby lingered in the hospital for several days before dying on Nov. 6, 2000.

A jury found Manila guilty of second-degree murder and child abuse.

Manila has insisted that he did not kill the child.

Then-chief prosecutor Clyde Lemons noted that a doctor testified that the baby was shaken “very hard,” consistent with shaken baby syndrome.