UMDA demands hidden ‘trustees’ to step forward

The United Micronesia Development Association has asked Presiding Judge Robert C. Naraja of the Superior Court for the Northern Mariana Islands to compel two defendants to provide evidence and appear in court on Saipan in UMDA’s ongoing multi-million dollar lawsuit against Robert Pfaff, John Larson, and their associates, shell companies, and offshore trusts.

“UMDA has been trying for months to get information and evidence on these mysterious off-shore entities and we are hopeful that the court will put an end to this run around,” said UMDA CEO and president Russ Snow. “We have settled with some of the defendants and we are anxious to get this matter resolved as soon as possible through a trial on Saipan. The hundreds of UMDA shareholders and the people of the CNMI have waited long enough to bring Mr. Pfaff and his associates to justice.”

On Feb. 3, UMDA attorneys filed a request for an evidentiary hearing on a preliminary injunction motion brought by defendants Rothschild Trust Guernsey Limited and Davina Limited. According to the filing, “Given Rothschild’s and Davina’s dearth of evidence to date, the court can properly order them to submit to an evidentiary hearing and adduce evidence supporting both the alleged merits of their claims and any alleged irreparable harm. This would force Rothschild and Davina—two offshore entities which are apparently acting for undisclosed principals or beneficiaries—to disclose who they are fronting for (and who is behind d efendant Concorde Trust, of which Rothschild is the trustee). UMDA believes they are fronting for defendants Robert Pfaff, John Larson and/or David Amir Makov—but so far Rothschild and Davina (as well as other “trust” defendants) have managed to conceal their principals and beneficiaries by wrongly refusing to produce any documents (which UMDA has been seeking for more than a year).”

Pfaff, Larson and Mavkov were convicted of multiple counts of tax fraud and are scheduled to be sentenced in New York in March.

UMDA chairman Jose Lifoifoi said, “It’s no surprise to me that these offshore entities would want to hide the fact that they are fronting for convicted criminals like Pfaff, Larson and Makov. But they can’t have it both ways—if they want to try to stop us from completing a lawful settlement with other defendants, they need to be in court telling us why. The fact is that they know that they have no claim to over $1 million in settlement money that rightfully belongs to UMDA and that there is no evidence that any harm would be done to them by a payout. This preliminary injunction motion is just another transparent attempt by defendants to delay the proceeding and distract attention from their illegal action and damage to UMDA.”

Lifoifoi concluded, “At this point, we’re calling defendants’ bluff. Where is the evidence for this preliminary injunction? Who is behind the veil of these mysterious companies? I suppose that defendants’ lawyers might argue again that Mr. Pfaff and Mr. Larson have other commitments, but just because they have been convicted of felonies and are waiting sentencing in their criminal case in New York doesn’t mean that they couldn’t testify by phone here on Saipan. And just as importantly, the trustees of these offshore trusts should be made to appear in court and testify. It’s time for defendants to stop wasting the court’s time and either come to Saipan and present the evidence or stop disrupting the settlement and let this case proceed to trial.”

UMDA was founded in 1966 in Saipan. UMDA’s shareholders include the government or governmental entities of the CNMI, Palau, Federated States of Micronesia, and thousands of individual Micronesians and their families. [B][I](UMDA)[/I][/B]