Court orders AGO to put Pam Brown’s name in Torres’ case

The Superior Court denied yesterday a motion to dismiss a case against former congressman Stanley Torres and two other defendants but ordered the government prosecutor to revise the case information and specifically put the name of the Attorney General.

Associate judge Juan T. Lizama said in his ruling that, while in most cases the identity of the Attorney General is not an issue, it must be supplied in Torres, et al case.

“Where the identity of the [Attorney General] is relevant to the defense, a defendant is entitled to know the identity of the Attorney General under whose authority penal summons issue and informations are filed and to have this stated on the record. Therefore, in this case, the court hereby orders the government to amend the information to include the name of the Attorney General from whom the signing attorney(s) claim authority,” Lizama said.

He “strongly encouraged” the government to include such information “in all future submissions in criminal cases.”

Torres and his co-defendants, Dorothy Sablan and Frank Ada, earlier petitioned the court to quash the penal summons and information filed by the AGO for not bearing the name of Attorney General Pam Brown.

Torres’ legal counsels Robert Torres and Perry Inos argued that Art. III Section 11 of the CNMI Constitution provides in pertinent part that the “Attorney General shall be responsible for…prosecuting violations of criminal law.”

As such, they argued that the Attorney General is the sole person charged with the power to prosecute criminals cases and all prosecutions must be brought in the Attorney General’s name.

They further said that rules provide that each information “shall be signed by the attorney for the government.”

The Attorney General’s Office, represented by chief prosecutor David Hutton and deputy attorney general Clyde Lemons, argued that neither the name nor the signature of the Attorney General is required by either the Constitution or court rules.

They said the Attorney General may delegate the power to institute criminal prosecutions to others in the office and the “attorney for the government,” under the rules, “can be any attorney who has authority delegated from the Attorney General.”

Lizama, in his ruling, said that the court must agree with the government.

He said that, while there is no question that the Attorney General is designated by the Constitution as the official empowered to bring criminal prosecution, there is also no question that the Attorney General may delegate a portion of that power to others.

Lizama said that delegation may include the right and power to produce, sign, and submit criminal information.

Further, he said that Rule 7 requires only that a criminal information be signed by an attorney who has a proper authority from the Attorney General, not necessarily the Attorney General him- or herself.

“The court must conclude that there is no right under our constitution to have the Attorney General named in an information or to have the signature of the Attorney General attached,” said Lizama.

But to avoid confusion, he said “it is the better practice to attach the name of the Attorney General.”

The defendants are charged with numerous crimes involving theft, misconduct in public office, and illegal use of public resources.

Torres is being charged in court for allegedly hiring a ghost employee, Dorothy Sablan, when he was still in office.

Sablan allegedly received at least five checks totaling $5,384.67 in government payroll in 2003, when she was actually off-island.

Ada allegedly prepared fraudulent time and attendance sheets indicating that Sablan rendered work when she was off-island.