June marks 1 year of inactivity in Torres’ pending criminal case

It has officially been one year since the Superior Court has issued any ruling or scheduling orders in the pending criminal case against former governor Ralph DLG Torres.

Last Tuesday, assistant attorney general James Kingman took to social media to express his concerns with the Superior Court’s lack of action on numerous pending pretrial motions and for not setting a trial date yet in the pending criminal case against former governor Torres.

As of press time, there still has been no updates.

“It has been one full year since the corruption trial that I was brought out here to prosecute was set to begin and the judge had not ruled on a single pending pretrial motion nor issued a scheduling order,” Kingman said in a social media post.

Specifically, June 5, 2023, was the last trial date set for Torres’ criminal case but since it was vacated due to several pending issues, Superior Court judge pro tem Arthur Barcinas has yet to issue a ruling or set a new trial date.

Last year, due to some unresolved pretrial issues before Barcinas, the prosecution and defense agreed that moving the June 5 jury trial was the best way to move forward in the case.

After a discussion during the pretrial back in 2023, and with the consent of the parties, Barcinas vacated the jury trial set for June 5.

In an interview with Kingman back in January, he said the prosecution has since provided available dates multiple times but to no avail.

The criminal case against the former governor was filed by the Office of the Attorney General on April 8, 2022.

In that case, Torres was charged with 12 counts of misconduct in public office and one count of theft relating to the issuance of airline tickets for business class, first class, or other premium class travel for himself and/or Diann T. Torres, his wife.

The case also alleged one count of contempt for failure to appear in compliance with a legislative subpoena.

On Aug. 23, 2022, judge pro tem Alberto Tolentino dismissed without prejudice the contempt charge against Torres.

On Oct. 26, 2023, Kingman refiled a separate charge of contempt and misconduct in public office against Torres.

That case remains pending in the Superior Court as well.