Federal court sanctions ‘vexatious litigant’

The federal court has sanctioned “vexatious litigant” John Sablan Pangelinan by ordering him to pay attorneys’ fees and court costs to attorney Robert T. Torres for including the lawyer’s clients in a $61.1 million lawsuit, which the court found frivolous.

U.S. District Court for the NMI designated judge Frances M. Tydingco-Gatewood ordered Pangelinan to pay Torres $6,651 in attorneys’ fees and $282 in court costs.

Tydingco-Gatewood sanctioned Pangelinan for filing the suit, which the judge deemed to be “repetitive, meritless, vexatious, abusive, and burdensome.”

The judge said she has reviewed the number of hours expended on this litigation by Torres and his associate counsel and the paralegal.

The hours expended, Tydingco-Gatwood said, are reasonable given Pangelinan’s numerous filings and allegations and the time necessary to respond and rebut.

She awarded Torres $2,481.25 for 14.25 hours at his rate of $175 per hour, $1,650 for 11 hours of work performed by his associate counsel, and $2,520 for 28 hours of work performed by his paralegal.

In January 2008, Pangelinan filed the $61.1 million lawsuit against judges Alex Munson and David Wiseman.

He also named as co-defendants two lawyers, a federal prosecutor, an FBI agent, two federal probation officers, two U.S. Marshals, and seven other people.

In the case he filed pro se (without a lawyer), Pangelinan also sued 13 grand jurors and 12 jurors.

Torres represented the defendants except the judges and federal employees.

In last week’s order declaring him a “vexatious litigant,” Tydingco-Gatewood prohibited Pangelinan from filing any lawsuit or documents in federal court that is related to a 1997 civil lawsuit filed against him.

The judge said that Pangelinan’s actions “have clearly caused, and will continue to cause if not abated, needless work and expense to not only the court and its staff, but to any other party who has incurred his wrath.”

She set many conditions in order for Pangelinan to be allowed to submit court documents.

On May 16, 2008, district court designated judge Juan T. Lizama ordered Pangelinan to spend 10 months in jail. Lizama revoked Pangelinan’s probation in his criminal conviction for violating numerous terms and conditions of his probation.

Last month, the Guam-based Tydingco-Gatewood dismissed Pangelinan’s $61.1 million lawsuit.

In that order, Tydingco-Gatewood ruled that the lawsuit “is repetitive, meritless, vexatious, abusive, and burdensome.”

Tydingco-Gatewood described the plaintiff as one of the Commonwealth’s most active pro se litigant.

The judge noted that court records show that Pangelinan filed 18 appeals related to matters having their genesis in the court’s judgment in a 1997 case in which he was found liable to pay $270,000.