Judge upholds jury’s guilty verdict vs woman who arranged fake marriages

U.S. District Court for the NMI Chief Judge Ramona V. Manglona has denied a motion to acquit Qiong Lu Pua, who was found guilty by a federal jury of orchestrating two sham marriages so that her brother and friend could obtain green cards.

Manglona said all the evidence on record would persuade a reasonable juror to find Pua guilty beyond a reasonable doubt of conspiring to defraud the United States.

“The defense raises an important concern about the risk of convictions on wholly unreliable perjured testimony, but this is not such a case,” said Manglona in denying Pua’s motion for acquittal.

She said the court will not disturb the jury’s verdict.

Pua, a Chinese who is a legal permanent resident of the United States, faces a maximum sentence of five years imprisonment and a $250,000 fine. She remains at liberty until her sentencing.

Pua, through counsel Mark Hanson, had asked the court to set aside the jury’s verdict and acquit her, saying the testimonies of Norma Nekaifes and Benigno Mettao were insufficient to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Pua participated in the conspiracy.

Pua used to be a neighbor of Nekaifes and Mettao on Saipan. Nekaifes and Mettao, both U.S. citizens who live and have a child together and adopted another, married Pua’s friend, Baoqin Ding, and her brother, Zhenqing Lu.

Hanson contended that Nekaifes and Mettao—as alleged conspirators, plea bargain witnesses, and admitted liars—cannot be believed as a matter of law.

But Manglona, however, ruled that sufficient circumstantial and corroborating evidence exists that a reasonable trier of fact could find that Pua participated in the marriage fraud conspiracy.

Manglona noted that Pua alleges no other error, no new trial is sought, and the evidence tends to corroborate Mettao and Nekaifes’ testimony.

Manglona said the common connection among all the conspirators is Pua, as she connects Nekaifes and Mettao to Lu and Ding.

The judge said the evidence received at the trial supports an inference that Pua participated in the wedding fraud conspiracy.

Knowing what she knew about the wedding party, it makes more sense that Pua participated in the conspiracy than that she was an innocent bystander, Manglona said.

She said as Mettao and Nekaifes’ neighbor, Pua knew that they were a couple.

“With that knowledge, it should have struck Pua as unusual that Mettao would marry Ding absent some strife with Nekaifes,” she pointed out.

Manglona said the inference of Pua’s participation in the Nekaifes/Lu wedding fraud case is even stronger.

“It strains credulity to believe that Pua’s brother could arrive on Saipan and immediately make plans to marry Pua’s neighbor without Pua participating in the scheme,” the judge said.

Particularly in light of the sham marriage between Mettao and Ding only five months earlier, it is much more likely that Pua purposefully arranged the fraudulent marriage as Nekaifes and Mettao testified, Manglona said.

“Any reasonable juror could have reached the same conclusion,” she added.