Before the legal eagle had actually started working for the company, Saipan casino operator Imperial Pacific International (IPI) may have lost its new general counsel.
The Saipan Tribune reported on Thursday that IPI’s departing general counsel Philip Tyndingco had informed a US District Court that Joey Patrick San Nicolas, who was named Tyndingco’s replacement recently, was now rethinking whether he wanted the job.
Tyndingco informed the court that Nicolas had called to convey his career doubts only five minutes before Tyndingco was due to attend a hearing of one of IPI’s many continuing legal battles.
Tyndingco, who will remain IPI’s general counsel until Friday (13), has already filed paperwork showing his intention to withdraw from representing IPI in civil suits brought by previous laborers, stiffed contractors and female VIP hosts who claim they were subject to sexual harassment on the job.
The seeming change of heart by San Nicolas, an ex-Commonwealth of Northern Mariana Islands (CNMI) attorney general, came only days after news came out that IPI CEO Mark Brown had suddenly resigned without any public explanation.
As reported by calvinayre.com, Brown stepped down one month after FBI agents raided IPI’s offices as well as CNMI Gov. Ralph Torres’s as part of an investigation into wire fraud, money laundering and unlawful campaign contributions.
On Tuesday, Torres felt obliged to issue a statement criticizing a “coordinated attack” by some CNMI legislators who he charged having an “obsession with taking down a governor that they simply do not like.”
Six independent members of the CNMI House of Representatives have called for the making of an investigative committee to determine how much truth is behind all that rumor currently surrounding Torres.
The House unanimously approved HB21-11 also on Tuesday, with the intention to clarify the powers of the Commonwealth Casino Commission (CCC). IPI opposes the bill partly because it would unveil of secrecy which currently covers the company’s financial dealings, including the status of its tax obligations.
IPI doesn’t seem to have too much to fret about, as some lawmakers told the Marianas Variety that when HB21-11 got to the CNMI Senate, it would be “dead on arrival.”
