U.S. District Court for the NMI Judge Frances Tydingco-Gatewood denied yesterday Jesus I. Taisague\u2019s motion to stop Gov. Eloy S. Inos and the CNMI government from withholding or failing to pay his pension benefits in full.<\/p>\n
In denying Taisague\u2019s motion for preliminary injunction, Tydingco-Gatewood said that, unlike a wrongfully terminated employee whose injury is the loss of all income and health insurance, Taisague\u2019s injury is no more than a 25-percent deferment on his pension\u2014without any loss of his health insurance coverage.<\/p>\n
The judge noted that Taisague has not shown why this 25-percent deferment is an \u201cirreparable injury.\u201d<\/p>\n
Tydingco-Gatewood said that Taisague\u2019s motion operates under a now-erroneous assumption that he will lose all his retirement benefits and therefore will be unable to pay for needed medical work, financial obligations, and sustenance.<\/p>\n
Tydingco-Gatewood said that Taisague asserts that he \u201cis still not getting his 100-percent pension\u201d without detailing any irreparable injuries that will follow this deficiency.<\/p>\n
The judge described the injuries Taisague referred to as \u201camorphous ones,\u201d such as \u201cdamage to reputation, emotional distress, and reduced sense of well-being.\u201d<\/p>\n
Tydingco-Gatewood said this case appears more akin to the monetary injury incurred from a loss of employment: He was receiving 100 percent of his pension payments; now he is receiving 75 percent.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis monetary change does not also carry a change in Taisague\u2019s duties or obligations. Nor does it carry a social stigma. At bottom, it is solely a monetary injury that can be repaired,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
Taisague also argues that nothing can stop the government from later electing to stop providing his retirement benefits.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is possible, to be sure,\u201d the judge concedes. \u201cBut harm must be more than possible; it must be likely.\u201d Tydingco-Gatewood pointed out that Taisague has not submitted any evidence suggesting this to be likely.<\/p>\n
In fact, the judge noted, all evidence indicates that Taisague will continue to receive 75 percent of his pension payments and full health insurance coverage.<\/p>\n
\u201cTherefore, the present possibility of the Commonwealth later electing to not pay Taisague any retirement benefits is not likely,\u201d Tydingco-Gatewood said.<\/p>\n
Taisague is suing Inos, the CNMI government, Finance, and the Retirement Fund for entering into a settlement agreement with Betty Johnson that, according to him, is unconstitutional and illegal.<\/p>\n
Taisague is among the 16 persons who opted out of the Johnson settlement agreement. He tried to intervene in Johnson\u2019s class action during the final fairness hearing but Tydingco-Gatewood denied his request as too late, among other reasons.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
U.S. District Court for the NMI Judge Frances Tydingco-Gatewood denied yesterday Jesus I. Taisague\u2019s motion to stop Gov. Eloy S. Inos and the CNMI government from withholding or failing to pay his pension benefits in full.<\/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-174378","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\/174378","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=174378"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/174378\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=174378"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=174378"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=174378"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}