The lawyers of Gov. Ralph DLG Torres want denied the Office of the Attorney General\u2019s motion to bar the introduction of evidence relating to other government officials who also traveled first class, premium class, or business class.<\/p>\n
OAG chief solicitor Robert Glass recently filed a motion in limine<\/em> seeking to prohibit Torres and his defense team from bringing up certain evidence in trial about other government employees who have traveled first class. A motion in limine<\/em> is defined as \u201c[a] pretrial request that certain inadmissible evidence not be referred to or offered at trial.\u201d<\/p>\n However, according to the opposition filed by Torres\u2019 lawyers yesterday, the OAG did not explain in its limine<\/em> motion how each evidence it seeks to exclude is: highly prejudicial, does not relate to any confrontation of a prosecution witness, does not tend to negate an essential element of each offense charged in the Information, and is not relevant to any defense theory.<\/p>\n \u201cThe prosecution does not explain how curative instructions can address its purported concerns. Instead, it appears that the prosecution is trying to use the in limine<\/em> motion to preclude Gov. Torres from using evidence to effectively challenge the prosecution\u2019s proof as well as support his defenses,\u201d the lawyer stated.<\/p>\n Torres is represented by a team of lawyers including Viola Alepuyo, Victorino Torres, Matthew Holley, and Anthony Aguon.<\/p>\n The defense explained that, by seeking to preclude the introduction of evidence relating to other government officials who traveled premium class, the OAG seeks to deprive Torres of key evidence to rebut essential elements of counts 1 to 13 filed against him, which relate to the issuance of airline tickets.<\/p>\n \u201cThe Legislature did not impose a civil monetary fine on a person who traveled in first or business class. Instead, the Legislature imposed a civil money penalty on the government employee who \u2018caused\u2019 the issuance of a ticket. Gov. Torres\u2019 defense to Counts 1-13 include showing that he did not \u2018cause\u2019 the issuance of a ticket in violation of \u00a7 7407(f). This means that Gov. Torres, as a defense, can show that someone other than himself caused the issuance of the tickets at issue,\u201d the defense explained.<\/p>\n The defense team added that evidence concerning tickets relating to the travel by other governmental officials in first class is necessary to show the commonality or consistent thread regarding the issuance of airline tickets to establish that someone other than Torres or the person traveling \u201ccaused\u201d the issuance of airline tickets for government travel.<\/p>\n \u201cDepriving Gov. Torres of such evidence precludes him from proving that \u2018issuance\u2019 of airline travel tickets for all Commonwealth travel is within the exclusive domain of a particular agency and if Torres is not an employee of that particular agency or department, then he did not violate the law,\u201d the motion said.<\/p>\n The governor\u2019s team of lawyers claim that the OAG\u2019s requests may not be seeking an in limine<\/em> ruling but is an effort for the court to implement a new evidentiary rule or procedure that will effectively disrupt the defense\u2019s presentation at trial by requiring prior court permission before asking any question or pursuing inquiry into travel by other governmental officials.<\/p>\n Aside from prohibiting evidence regarding other government officials flying first class, Glass also sought to bar the defendant from introducing evidence, making arguments, or otherwise mentioning any potential penalties or collateral consequences he faces if convicted; bar the defense from stating or arguing that the prosecution is politically motivated; and to bar Torres\u2019 team from mentioning the upcoming 2022 general election \u201cas such has no bearing on any fact that would be relevant for this trial,\u201d Glass stated in his motion.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The lawyers of Gov. Ralph DLG Torres want denied the Office of the Attorney General\u2019s…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":24,"featured_media":370836,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[94],"tags":[86],"class_list":["post-370939","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-headlines","tag-oag"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/370939","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\/24"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=370939"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/370939\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/370836"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=370939"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=370939"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=370939"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}