Legal quagmire: Guam governor hits AG's contracts with private lawyers

Lou Leon Guerrero Douglas Moylan

By Pacific Island Times News Staff

Gov. Lou Leon Guerrero hurled new accusations and sought another criminal investigation against Attorney General Douglas Moylan, but her ability to appoint a special prosecutor is stuck in a quagmire.

Amid their escalating feud, the governor sought Moylan’s approval of her request to appoint a special prosecutor to investigate his office—and possibly, prosecute him—over $1.5 million worth of contracts with private lawyers, which allegedly violated Guam's procurement and budget laws.

This was the governor’s second request for a special prosecutor. She previously sought an investigation into the OAG's hiring of Moylan's brother, Scott Moylan, and fiancée, Sheenalyn Hawkins.

Jeffrey Moots, the governor’s legal counsel, noted that the executive branch may not enter into a legal service contract without the attorney general’s signature.

“Because you would be the subject of the investigation and potential prosecution related to these actions, and the governor has the Organic Act responsibility to ensure enforcement of the related laws, it is necessary that the governor appoint a special assistant attorney general and a special prosecutor to investigate and, as necessary, prosecute you for violations of Guam law,” Moots said in a letter to Moylan.

The governor's earlier petition for declaratory judgment on her authority to appoint a special prosecutor is pending in court.

“The courts should justly reject political manipulation at the taxpayers' expense intended to stop legitimate investigations and prosecutions by the elected public auditor and the AG’s Office,” Moylan said.  

The second request for a special prosecutor was based on allegations that Moylan may have violated Guam's procurement law and the budget act when he hired private attorneys to perform legal services for the OAG.

“Keep crying wolf, and no one will believe you anymore,” Moylan wrote in response to the new letter sent April 15. “The governor’s FOIA requests and threatening letters seek to distract from ongoing criminal investigations of this governor’s administration.”

In his letter to Moylan, Moots said the attorney general did not satisfy the governor’s Freedom of Information Act request for procurement documents related to six legal contracts with Edward C. Han ($25,000), Sean Brown ($25,000), Eric Miller ($45,000), Martin Dinehart ($25,000), Vandeveld Law Offices ($25,000) and Consovoy McCarthy PLLC ($175,000.00). 

Besides the six contracts, Moots said the OAG also signed a $25,000 contract for legal consultant services awarded in 2023 to the Torres Law Group without corresponding procurement documents.

The seven contracts had a total amount of $345,000.

 Moots said documents he subsequently obtained from the Department of Administration revealed $1.21 million worth of additional contracts and fund recertifications that the OAG did not provide in its FOIA responses.

These include funds certified for Consovoy McCarthy PLLC ($1 million); McDonald Law Office ($65,603.50); Edward Han ($25,000); Vandeveld Law Offices ($50,000); and William

J. Ruotolo ($70,000).

“The very lack of a procurement record for these contracts violates the law. Procurement records are public records, subject to inspection and copy by the public,” Moots said.

“This is the public’s money, and the attorney general has been spending it without a care in the world,” the governor said in a statement.

“The general fund is not the AG’s personal piggy bank. He’s not allowed to just hand lucrative contracts to his buddies without so much as glancing in the general direction of the law,” Communications Director Krystal Paco-San Agustin. “Every time we think we have seen it all, the AG comes up with more ways to violate the very law he is supposed to uphold.”

Moylan, however, said the Department of Administration has been part of this procurement process.

“For over a decade, budget law authorizations since as far back as 2014 with Generals Barrett-Anderson, Camacho, and carried on by myself allowed AG’s offices to hire prosecutors and attorneys to supplement their staff to protect and to do critical legal work for us at the people's law firm,” Moylan said.

“Democratically-elected AGs act upon their legal opinions of budget laws, as was the case herein, and AG legal opinions trump the opinions of the governor’s private attorney,” he added.

Moots asked Moylan to respond to the governor’s request by April 22. "Should he decline, the governor will seek a declaratory judgment in accordance with Guam Supreme Court guidance," the governor's office said in a press release.

Leon Guerrero and Moylan have been trading scathing barbs over several issues.

The feud began escalating when Moylan declined to sign the governor's lease agreement with the Navy for the proposed use of Eagle's Field as the site of the new hospital.

Last year, the attorney general further infuriated the governor when he launched investigations into 22 GovGuam agencies and subsequently withdrew his legal services from these offices.

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