‘Interviews in CUC scam case lawful’

The Superior Court has found lawful the interviews conducted by Commonwealth Utilities Corp. officials and Attorney General Investigative Unit investigators on a former CUC customer service representative who was among several then employees accused of engaging in a power disconnection scam.

Associate Judge Ramona V. Manglona made the finding in denying Rita I. Tarope’s motion to suppress her statements obtained by CUC officials during the interviews.

Manglona also denied Tarope’s motion to suppress her statements to investigators as involuntary or taken in violation of her Miranda rights.

“Based upon the evidence presented, and the foregoing authority, the court determines that the defendant’s statements at her interview on April 5, 2007, were not elicited by a violation of [her] constitutional privilege against self-incrimination or her right to due process of law,” the judge said in her written order issued Monday.

Manglona said the Commonwealth did not do anything to overborne Tarope’s will, and the court finds from the totality of the circumstances that defendant’s statements to investigators given on April 23 and 24, 2007, were voluntary.

“There is no fundamental unfairness involved in permitting criminal investigators to ask the same questions posed in a prior civil investigation; however, the right to assert the privilege is retained even if the witness is uncertain of its scope,” the judge said.

Tarope was among several defendants charged with theft of services, conspiracy to commit theft of services, and misconduct in public office. The government later dismissed the misconduct in public office charge.

Tarope and four other co-defendants were allegedly engaged in scam by purposely skipping the names of family members and friends from a power disconnection list. Tarope allegedly got a total of $6,144.29 from 11 accounts.

In March 2007, a CUC official met with two Office of Public Auditor investigators and an AGIU investigator to report allegations of misconduct by several CUC employees, including Tarope.

Following that meeting, AGIU and the Department of Public Safety launched a joint investigation into the matter.

On March 29, 2007, then CUC executive director Anthony C. Guerrero hand-delivered a notice to Tarope, informing her that she was suspended from her job without pay and that the “the proposed termination will not be finalized until you have had the opportunity to respond to the statements made in this letter of proposed adverse action.”

On April 5, 2007, the scheduled interview was held at the CUC office in Dandan. In attendance were Tarope, two CUC officials, and CUC legal counsel Edward Manibusan.

Tarope was not advised that she and other employees were already the focus of a separate criminal investigation.

On April 23 and 24, 2007, a detective and an AGIU investigator questioned the defendant at the CUC office, but was told she was not under arrest. Tarope was also advised of her constitutional rights. The defendant made admissions in the course of these interviews.

In May 2007, Tarope tendered her resignation.

The defendant argued that the court should suppress any and all of her statements to CUC officials at the April 5 interview, and all evidence derived from it.

She asserted that her statements were elicited by the government under the threat that she would be terminated if she failed to answer the questions put to her, thus rendering her answers officially compelled and therefore inadmissible against her in a criminal proceeding.

Manglona disagreed. The judge said the evidence presented establishes that Tarope’s statements to CUC officers were not compelled.

Tarope separately moved to suppress the same statements to AGIU investigators on the grounds that they were involuntary and obtained through custodial interrogation without a valid waiver of her constitutional rights as required by Miranda warnings.

Manglona said because Tarope was not subjected to custodial interrogation, Miranda warnings are not required and the government does not have the particular burden of proving that defendant knowingly and voluntarily waived her constitutional rights.

“The evidence actually presented…strongly supports the finding that defendant voluntarily answered the questions put to her by investigators during the April 23-24 sessions,” Manglona said.

The judge said the answers Tarope provided at her CUC interview on March 5, were not the product of coercion and no basis has been presented for finding that the statements were involuntary.

Manglona said that, during her April 23-24 interview with criminal investigators, Tarope may well have perceived it useless to assert her privilege against self-incrimination in response to questions regarding the very same incidents addressed at her prior administrative interview, during which she had already made disclosures.