Lt. Gov. Timothy P. Villagomez and co-defendants James and Joaquina Santos yesterday pleaded not guilty to the new bribery and other charges filed against them in federal court.<\/p>\n
\u201cNot guilty, your honor,\u201d said Villagomez when U.S. District Court for the NMI chief judge Alex Munson asked how he pleads to the charges contained in the superseding indictment.<\/p>\n
Villagomez was with Guam attorney Delia Lujan, daughter of Micronesia\u2019s popular defense attorney, David J. Lujan.<\/p>\n
The Santos couple also pleaded not guilty to the same charges. Their attorneys\u2014Ramon Quichocho and Victorino Torres\u2014appeared at the hearing. <\/p>\n
The superseding indictment charges the defendants with bribery concerning a program receiving federal funds, conspiracy to defraud and to commit offenses against the U.S., wire fraud, and theft concerning a program receiving federal funds.<\/p>\n
Only the bribery charges were new as the remaining charges were the same ones already filed against the three defendants.<\/p>\n
The three also waived their right to a speedy trial in order for them to have more time to study the new charges in preparation for their defense.<\/p>\n
Munson granted the defendants\u2019 request and set the new trial for March 30, 2009, at 9am. It was the second time the defendants waived their right to a speedy trial.<\/p>\n
Munson said the defendants shall remain at liberty with the same terms and conditions as the court had previously imposed.<\/p>\n
Former Gov. Pedro Tenorio and his wife, Sophia, were among the relatives, family members and friends of Villagomez and the Santos couple who watched the proceedings.<\/p>\n
After the hearing, attorney Lujan told Saipan Tribune it was just a superseding indictment and that Villagomez pleaded not guilty. \u201cWe have no further comment other than what we stated in the hearing,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Attorney Quichocho, counsel for Joaquina Santos, told Saipan Tribune that they\u2019re still reviewing the superseding indictment.<\/p>\n
\u201cSo we just deal with it as we approach the trial,\u201d Quichocho said.<\/p>\n
The new charge alleges that Villagomez accepted a $15,000 bribe from the Santos couple for approving the purchase of Rydlyme, a cleaning and de-scaling chemical, for the Commonwealth Utilities Corp.<\/p>\n
The Santos couple were also charged with bribery for allegedly offering the $15,000 to Villagomez.<\/p>\n
According to the indictment, on Dec. 7, 2007, James Santos signed a check in the amount of $15,000 drawn upon an account belonging to himself and Joaquina Santos, and made payable to Villagomez.<\/p>\n
Assistant U.S. Attorney Eric O\u2019Malley said that on the same day, Villagomez deposited the check into his personal bank account.<\/p>\n
A day before that, Dec. 6, 2007, Joaquina Santos allegedly deposited a CUC Operations Fund check in the amount of $50,000 into an account belonging to Blue Pacific as payment for Rydlyme.<\/p>\n
O\u2019Malley alleged that on Jan. 15, 2008, a co-conspirator, acting on behalf of CUC, authorized payment of $10,000 to Blue Pacific.<\/p>\n
The prosecutor said that on Jan. 16, 2008, Joaquina Santos deposited another CUC Operations Fund check into an account belonging to Blue Pacific.<\/p>\n
James Santos was the alleged owner and operator of a company called ISLAS, which supplied CUC with Rydlyme. ISLAS was then allegedly reconstituted under a different name, Blue Pacific.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Lt. Gov. Timothy P. Villagomez and co-defendants James and Joaquina Santos yesterday pleaded not guilty to the new bribery and other charges filed against them in federal court.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-129688","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-local-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/129688","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=129688"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/129688\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=129688"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=129688"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=129688"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}