Previous Story
Jury finds Ogumoro guilty
Conviction closes sad chapter in CNMI history
Ambrosio T. Ogumoro
After deliberating for less than three hours, the six jurors reached the guilty verdict as to the charges of conspiracy to commit theft of services and theft of services.
Associate Judge David A. Wiseman said he will announce at 10:30am tomorrow, Jan. 26, his verdict as to the nine other remaining charges against Ogumoro.
Wiseman will also announce the sentencing date on Tuesday.
Wiseman will decide the nine remaining charges: six counts of misconduct in public office, one count of conspiracy to commit obstructing justice: Interference with a law enforcement officer or witness, obstructing justice: interference with a law enforcement officer or witness, and criminal coercion.
Ogumoro remained calm when a court staff read the verdict at 3:35pm. His family members, supporters, and friends were silent when the verdict was announced.
Saipan Tribune tried to get comments from Ogumoro about the verdict, but he did not say anything as he quickly walked outside the Judicial Complex in Susupe.
Attorney Edward C. Arriola, counsel for Ogumoro, also refused to comment.
Special prosecutor George Hasselback, counsel for the government, in an interview said the maximum penalty of two counts is up to five years in prison.
Hasselback said the jurors returned a proper verdict.
“I think today was a good day,” Hasselback said. OPA legal counsel Ashley Kost assisted Hasselback in the trial.
At the closing arguments on Friday morning, Hasselback discussed several text messages and phone calls between Ogumoro, former governor Benigno R. Fitial, Buckingham, several DPS police officers, Commonwealth Ports Authority officials, and a government lawyer between Aug. 3 and 4, 2012.
Hasselback said the witnesses that they presented testified about what the text messages and the phone calls were all about—they were talking about police escort, shielding Buckingham from being served with penal summons.
Hasselback said they believe that they have proven beyond reasonable doubt that a group of people was conspiring to commit crimes.
“Mr. Ogumoro is right in the middle. As I told you before in my opening statements, he made it happen,” the special prosecutor said.
Hasselback said the biggest overt act of them all was when Ogumoro was telling FBI special agent Haejun Park that he was under an executive order.
Hasselback said the breaking piece of testimony was when Office of the Public Auditor then-investigator Juanette David-Atalig stated she was shocked upon being informed by a police officer that Ogumoro threatened to arrest her and OPA investigator Juan Santos if they would not cease trying to serve the penal summons to Buckingham.
In the defense’s closing arguments, Arriola said as he stated in his opening statements, if OPA investigators have done their job by serving the penal summons to Buckingham when the latter was at his office on Aug. 3, 2012, Ogumoro would not have been in court.
Arriola said Ogumoro took the witness stand and stated that the purpose of the escort service was to prevent the media from harassing Buckingham.
Arriola said this was never rebutted by the government.
Arriola said the information on a threat to arrest OPA investigators started by a mistaken misrepresentation of testimony by Police Officer Juan Mendiola.
“I submit that the government has failed to prove beyond reasonable doubt of the charges,” he said.
In the government’s rebuttal, Hasselback said there were over 90 phone calls from different people in this case.
Hasselback said he would have loved to see notarized written statements about Ogumoro and others in this conspiracy.
Hasselback said that’s not how conspiracy works.
He said in this case, the conspiracy was done by cellphones that was carried out even at 3:15am.
Hasselback said Ogumoro testified that it was his genuine belief that the purpose was to escort a “sick, old man” to avoid the media.
“Can you believe him?” the special prosecutor said.
Hasselback said Ogumoro’s version of the truth does not matchup.
The trial began on Tuesday.
Ogumoro is the only remaining defendant in this case.
Last Jan. 13, former Commonwealth Ports Authority police chief Jordan Kosam entered a guilty plea while the charges against his co-defendant, former CPA police captain John T. Rebuenog, were dismissed.
Kosam signed a plea deal with the government and pleaded guilty to one count of misconduct in public office.
Superior Court Presiding Judge Robert C. Naraja sentenced the 43-year-old Kosam to one year imprisonment, but suspended the imposition of the sentence. Naraja placed Kosam on three years of supervised release.
Wiseman dismissed the charges against Rebuenog after special prosecutor Hasselback moved to drop the charges.
Former governor Benigno R. Fitial pleaded guilty, while Buckingham was convicted during a bench trial. The charges against Fitial’s former personal driver and bodyguard Jermaine Joseph W. Nekaifes were dismissed.
