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Lizama junks plea bargain of ex-Customs cashier
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Posted on Jan 18 2006
Superior Court Associate Judge Juan T. Lizama rejected yesterday a plea agreement entered by the Attorney General’s Office and a former Customs cashier charged with stealing public money at the post office.
In turning down the plea bargain, Lizama said he believes that the sentence proposed in the agreement against defendant Genoveva DLG. Lee is not sufficient, considering the seriousness of the charges.
Chief Prosecutor Jeffrey Moots told the Saipan Tribune that former assistant attorney general John Eaton was the one who negotiated the agreement.
Following Lizama’s ruling, Moots said they would redo the plea bargain.
Under the plea agreement, the proposed prison term is three years, all suspended, with credit for the two days Lee had already served in jail for theft. The agreement also sought supervised probation, $3,000 in restitution, $100 fine, and 20 hours of community work service, among other things.
Moots stated in the information that, from May 2005 and continuing to August 2005, Lee took $3,000 that belonged to the CNMI government.
Lee, 45, was arrested in September 2005 by members of the Customs Task Force at the Customs Training Center.
Lee confessed to stealing over $3,000 since May 2005, although Customs agents’ investigation indicated that there was a total of $10,800 missing in taxpayers’ money from Customs, according to a member of the Customs Task Force.
The Customs officer stated in his report that the director of Customs and the acting chief of Customs had requested for an internal investigation against Lee over the missing money.
Lee allegedly admitted to investigators that she had been taking the money that she received from customers at Customs Service to buy methamphetamine or “ice” and to pay her bills.
