Sex trafficking case suspect wants judge’s order vacated

A suspect in a sex trafficking case wants the federal court to nullify a judge’s order to deny his bid to withdraw his guilty plea.

Wei Lin, through counsel Bruce Berline, has asked U.S. District Court for the NMI designated Judge David O. Carter to re-hear his motion to withdraw his guilty plea.

Last July, U.S. District Court for the NMI Chief Judge Ramona V. Manglona granted Lin’s motion to recuse herself from his case—a sex trafficking case—after he implicated the judge’s brother, former Saipan senator and current Commonwealth Ports Authority board member Thomas “Kiyu” Villagomez, as an alleged organizer of a prostitution conspiracy.

Carter was then assigned to the case. Manglona reset the sentencing hearing to Aug. 29, 2018.

In Lin’s motion to vacate order, Berline said that Manglona twice denied Lin’s’s motion to withdraw his guilty plea.

Berline said while it did not take an appeal to disqualify Manglona, the disqualification occurred after the judge decided these substantive motions.

The lawyer said the facts giving rise to grounds for disqualification existed prior to Manglona presiding over the case and were specifically brought to the court’s attention prior to the determination even of the first motion to withdraw.

Berline said the issue here is an important one—the possible withdrawal of Lin’s guilty plea based on a gross mischaracterization of his likely sentence by his former attorneys.

He said Lin’s stake in the outcome of this motion affects his fundamental right to effective assistance of counsel, his right to a trial, and his interest in presenting a defense.

Berline said the facts requiring the disqualification could give rise to an inference that Manglona denied Lin’s motion on invalid grounds.

“Lin should have an opportunity to have his motion heard and decided by a judge untainted by the appearance of partiality,” he asserted.

Moreover, the lawyer said, doing so would preserve “the appearance of justice.”

In her order in July granting Lin’s motion for disqualification, Manglona said that, had Lin presented this new information at an earlier time, she would have recused herself even in the absence of a motion.

The new information referred to when Lin included a 2013 private investigator’s report of an interview taken of Villagomez.

Lin was accused of luring women from China to Saipan on false promises of jobs and then forcing them into prostitution once they got on the island.

In April 2012, Lin was charged with three counts of sex trafficking and one count of financially benefitting from a sex trafficking venture. The sex trafficking occurred between July 2010 and November 2010 at the Rosen Music Studio karaoke bar on Saipan.

On June 8, 2012, Lin pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit sex trafficking.

In March 2015, Manglona sentenced Lin to 235 months of imprisonment. Lin, through Berline, appealed his sentence to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit.

In November 2016, the Ninth Circuit reversed the sentence and remanded the case to the District Court for resentencing. The resentencing has been reset many times.

Lin, through Berline, filed a motion last July, requesting that Manglona disqualify herself from his case as Thomas Villagomez is the judge’s brother. Manglona granted Lin’s motion to disqualify.

In Lin’s motion to vacate order filed last Tuesday, Berline said the defendant accepted the plea deal based upon his reliance of his then-counsel’s advice that the base offense level would be 14, and thus, with likely enhancements, the sentencing guidelines would be around 37 to 70 months.

Lin and the prosecution sought guidance from the court by filing motions to determine the appropriate guideline; however, both motions were denied.

Later, Berline said, a similar issue was presented to the court in the course of the sentencing of Lin’s co-defendant, Yanchun Li.

There, Berline said, in an order dated Feb. 21, 2013, the court determined that the base offense level for a conspiracy is 34.

Manglona’s determination, the lawyer said, resulted in Lin filing a motion to withdraw his guilty plea on April 16, 2013.

Berline said Lin’s motion to withdraw his guilty plea was premised upon his prior counsel’s incorrect legal advice that if he pleaded guilty he would be facing a guidelines range of three to six years of imprisonment while the court’s calculation of the guidelines range was approximately 20 years of imprisonment.

Berline said that, on Sept. 12, 2013, Lin’s previous counsel filed certain documents, under seal, that contained information about the possible involvement of Manglona’s brother.

Berline said that, although Lin’s counsel at that time did not move to disqualify Manglona, that same day, the judge issued an order declining to disqualify herself after reviewing the sealed documents.

He said thereafter, on Nov. 3, 2013, Manglona denied Lin’s motion to withdraw his guilty plea.

Then counsel of Lin withdrew and Berline was appointed new counsel for the defendant in December 2013.

Berline said after the Ninth Circuit determined Manglona’s calculation was incorrect, the U.S. government came up with a new theory of sentencing that would result in a guidelines level of 36 and a range of 188 to 235 months of imprisonment.

Berline said the sentence was similar to the one previously imposed on Lin.

He said Manglona indicated her agreement with the prosecution’s new recalculation of the guidelines range, and, on March 27, 2017, Lin again moved to withdraw his guilty plea.

He said that, on April 14, 2017, Manglona denied the motion from the bench for essentially the same reasons contained in the previous order denying Lin’s previous motion to withdraw his guilty plea.