The New-York-based lawyer for seven former construction workers who were awarded a default judgment in their case against Imperial Pacific International Holdings, Ltd. and its subcontractors told the court that IPI board chair Cui Li Jie\u2019s attempts to place all blame for her noncompliance on her lawyer, Juan T. Lizama, \u201cfalls flat\u201d due to Cui\u2019s and her translator\u2019s own \u201cpattern of obstructionist and disobedient behavior.\u201d<\/p>\n
This argument is contained in the second status report that lawyer Aaron Halegua submitted yesterday to the U.S. District Court, where he outlined Cui\u2019s failure to obey the court\u2019s preservation order for the NMI.<\/p>\n
Cui has been at the center of legal complications in the past for being unable to preserve and surrender her cell phone to the court. <\/p>\n
In response to Cui\u2019s June 1 request for time to find \u201ca responsible and competent\u201d lawyer, Halegua reminded Cui and the court that Lizama was an attorney that she voluntarily chose to represent her, and said that Cui will have a full opportunity to explain how Lizama is mostly to blame whenever her and Chi submit their opposition to the court preservation order. Halegua, however, says that such arguments rarely prevail.<\/p>\n
Further, Halegua took issue with the portion of Cui\u2019s request where she asked the court to understand her situation, as she does not speak English or \u201cknow the American legal system well.\u201d Halegua states that the court has taken great care to properly explain the legal proceedings to Cui through her chosen translator, Howyo Chi, and says that \u201cthe plain reality is that Ms. Cui has obstructed plaintiffs from obtaining discovery at every turn.\u201d<\/p>\n
In the June 2 status report, Halegua provided five past incidents where Cui has been uncooperative with the court that do not have any connection to Lizama. According to Halegua, Cui in the past has:<\/p>\n
Evaded service of and failed to respond to a subpoena, and \u201cwhen she did appear provided evasive and untruthful testimony.\u201d<\/p>\n
Allegedly deleted WeChat data from her phone with help of associates in reaction to Halegua\u2019s March 4 request for her to preserve her phone data.<\/p>\n
Had translator Chi file a declaration that Cui\u2019s phone data had been preserved and copied, despite Cui\u2019s WeChat data returning a report of \u201canalysis is empty\u201d and the copying process only taking four minutes.<\/p>\n
Remained in possession of her cell phone and claimed to have lost the SIM card she has been using since arriving in Saipan, and
\nContinued to use her cell phone even after the court issued a preservation order for her cell phone on March 31. <\/p>\n
\u201cThis pattern of noncompliance cannot all fall solely on the shoulders of Mr. Lizama,\u201d said Halegua, who is the lawyer for the plaintiffs in the case Tianming Wang, et. al vs. Gold Mantis Construction Decoration (CNMI) LLC, et. al.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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