Online petition to recall Inos will not continue… for now

An online petition seeking the recall of Gov. Eloy S. Inos will no longer continue.

According to citizen activist Glen Hunter, he drafted “the draft petition to recall Inos if he moved forward with a full pardon. He did not and opted for a commutation.”

“While I am not at all happy about the removal of the jail time, I am very glad that a full pardon was not granted. I do not intend on finalizing the recall petition. Will someone else? Perhaps,” Hunter said.

Hunter added “that there are many members of our community that feel strongly that (former governor) Fitial should not have been given any special treatment at all and if anything should be treated more harshly because if the position he held.”

“I am glad, however, that his criminal record was not erased completely and that history will remember him (Fitial) as the first CNMI governor who so blatantly abused his powers that the people of the CNMI rose up and challenged him. The people’s voice was heard and the Legislature impeached him on grounds of blatantly corrupt acts,” he said.

The governor on Sunday handed a decision to commute the prison sentence for Fitial citing the former official’s health condition. Fitial was to serve a one-year prison sentence starting Monday, but with the commutation order, he will not serve any jail time.

But the commutation order stated that, “all other conditions, requirements, and obligations imposed by the court shall not be affected by this Commutation Order and shall remain.”

US Attorney for the CNMI?

Hunter said his focus right now is to “demand to the federal government to immediately install our own U.S. Attorney.”

“I strongly believe that if we had one when Fitial committed many of the major crimes, a CNMI-based U.S. Attorney would not have turned a blind eye and would have endured that justice was served years ago rather than having our public wait over five years for the local courts and our OPA (Office of the Public Auditor) to bring Fitial to justice,” he said.

Hunter lamented that it is long past due that the CNMI be granted its own U.S. Attorney.

“We are the only place in all of the USA (and territories) that has a U.S. district court but no U.S. Attorney. We have a federal judge. We have a Federal Magistrate Judge, we have a staffed U.S. Attorney’s Office, we have Federal Court support staff, and we are in the process of constructing a multi-million dollar, brand new federal district court, yet we SHARE a federal U.S. Attorney. That is unacceptable,” he said.

He added that the CNMI has “been sharing a U.S. Attorney who is placed in Guam and covering the CNMI.” Hunter was referring to U.S. Attorney for the Districts of Guam and CNMI Alicia Limtiaco

Hunter said her office would have been the one to bring charges against Fitial.

“I’m glad that although we had a federal U.S. Attorney based out of Guam and our own AG’s office both turn blind eyes to Fitial’s outright corrupt acts that our own CNMI OPA rose up to investigate, prosecute, and obtain a conviction,” Hunter, in a post on social media earlier said.