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Quichochos found liable to pay Kim $387,791 more
$2.4M award to Kim now reaches $2.8M
Disbarred lawyer Ramon K. Quichocho and his wife, Frances, have been found liable to pay a total of $387,791.15 to businesswoman Jung Ja Kim for her damages, costs, and attorney’s fees.
The award brings to $2,799,510.24 the total amount that the Quichocho couple is liable to pay Kim.
On March 28, 2014, a federal court jury reached a unanimous verdict holding the Quichocho couple and his law firm liable to pay a total of $2,411,719.09 in damages to Kim. The trial in Kim’s racketeering lawsuit began on Feb. 3, 2014.
In her order on Monday, U.S. District Court for the NMI Chief Judge Ramona V. Manglona ruled that the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act requires that Kim receive treble damages, costs, and reasonable attorney’s fees.
Manglona, however, agreed with the Quichochos that some of the fees and costs requested are inadequately documented.
Manglona amended the judgment issued against the Quichochos to reflect the trebling of damages in each of Kim’s three RICO claims, from $25,000 to $75,000, for a total of $225,000.
In granting Kim’s motion for costs and attorney’s fees in part and denying in part, Manglona awarded $110,625 in fees and $728.78 in costs to Kim’s counsel, Colin M. Thompson.
The judge also awarded $48,909.37 in fees and $2,528 in costs to Kim’s other counsel, Robert T. Torres.
Manglona said the RICO statute mandates treble damages to prevailing plaintiffs and that in this case Kim prevailed in each of her three RICO claims.
The Quichochos, through counsel, argued, among other things, that a plaintiff may not recover twice for the same injury.
Manglona disagreed. She ruled that prevailing RICO plaintiffs prove the exception, and defendants fail to provide any caselaw suggesting that treble damages in RICO actions are forbidden.
“To the contrary, the treble damages rule is sound,” the judge said, citing precedent.
