Torres insists on suppression of evidence

Former congressman Stanley Torres insisted that evidence obtained by the Office of Public Auditor even before the Dec. 11, 2003 warrantless search on his offices was illegally obtained and should be suppressed.

If granted by the Superior Court, the government would have practically lost most of its evidence against Torres, who is facing criminal charges for allegedly employing a ghost worker during his tenure.

The ex-congressman’s lawyer, former attorney general Robert Torres, said that the OPA improperly seized government agency records without obtaining a warrant.

But deputy attorney general Clyde lemons Jr. defended the OPA’s information gathering from other government agencies and said that there was no seizure of records at all.

“It is a specious argument at best to state as defendant does that there is a constitutionally recognized privacy interest in the records the Public Auditor obtained from other government agencies, as was his right to do so,” Lemons said.

“An ordinary citizen…with no constitutional nor statutory authority to investigate the use of public funds…could have obtained any and all of the records the Public Auditor obtained by way of an Open Government Act,” he said.

Robert Torres said, though, that no constitutional or statutory provision authorizes the OPA to conduct a criminal investigation. He said that, while the OPA is authorized to access documents in connection with its auditing responsibilities, what occurred in Stanley’s case was no audit.

Torres said the OPA obtained data from government agencies to build a criminal prosecution.

“Since OPA’s investigation of congressman Torres was as far from an audit as a fish from a bicycle, however, OPA’s attempt to hide behind its auditing powers is, at best, pretextual,” he said. “OPA’s ‘investigatory’ authority is circumscribed by statute to relate to audits, programs and operations involving the expenditure of public funds,” he added.

Earlier, associate judge Juan T. Lizama handed down the ruling that suppressed the evidence seized from the Dec. 11, 2003 and Feb. 25, 2004 raids after Lemons conceded that they should be suppressed.

The former congressman and co-defendant Dorothy Sablan, who used to be the lawmaker’s office manager, are facing multiple charges of conspiracy to commit theft, conspiracy to commit theft by deception, and illegal use of public supplies, services, time and personnel.

Stanley Torres also faces multiple counts of misconduct in public office, while prosecutors have also charged Sablan with multiple counts of theft, theft by deception and receiving stolen property.

The AGO filed the charges against Torres, Sablan, and Frank Ada sometime in March 2004. The court later dismissed the charges against Ada, who used to be a legislative staff, without prejudice to their refiling.

Lemons had accused Torres and Sablan of engaging in a fraudulent scheme, wherein the latter received government monies through payroll when she did not actually perform work and was off-island. Sablan allegedly received at least five checks totaling $5,384.67 in government payroll in 2003. Ada allegedly prepared fraudulent time and attendance sheets indicating that Sablan rendered work.