The score now is 0-2 in Guam Waterworks Authority’s ongoing legal battle against Core Tech International. Superior Court of Guam Judge Elyze Iriarte ruled Friday against a second round of motions the public utility made as it desperately attempts to justify its reckless actions surrounding the island’s Northern District Wastewater Treatment Plant.

The court battle began in December 2018, when the Calvo administration took CTI to court, unprovoked, to have the court change a certificate of title indicating CTI owns the land under the NDWWTP. Prior to that court battle, CTI had not disturbed the operation of the plant on its property, nor had it invoiced for any rent.

The dispute is over the ownership of Lot 10184-7, Ukudu, Dededo, where GWA operates the plant. Ironically the dispute arose from actions taken by the government of Guam itself, after the Guam Ancestral Lands Commission quitclaimed the land to the ancestral landowner: the Estate of Jose Martinez Torres, on October 17, 2006. Shortly after, the Torres estate sold the property to the owner of Younex Corporation. The Department of Land Management in 2010 and 2014 issued certificates of title evidencing Younex owned the properties. In 2015, CTI bought the properties in a legal sale. Documents proving these facts are filed at DLM.

Following the case, which was filed by then-Department of Land Management director Michael Borja and later joined by GWA, the public utility bulldozed a fence owned by CTI and built a fence expanding its presence on Lot 10184-7 into CTI’s adjacent Lot 10184-6. CTI shortly after counterclaimed in the case against the company, suing for inverse condemnation on a number of grounds.

On November 30, 2021, Judge Iriarte issued a decision and order on several GWA motions attempting to throw the case out of court by claiming CTI had no standing to bring its claims, ironically. The irony was not lost on the judge, who stated in her decision and order, in part, that CTI indeed held an ownership interest in Lot 10184-7, and that it was questionable whether GWA had any right to use or occupy the property.

GWA on January 4, 2022, through new counsel Calvo, Fisher & Jacob, filed a petition to the Guam Supreme Court to accept an interlocutory appeal that essentially would be heard to reverse Judge Iriarte’s November 30 decision and order. Simultaneously, GWA filed a motion to stay the ongoing court case in Judge Iriarte’s court.

On Friday, the judge, in a half-page order, denied GWA’s motion for an expedited hearing on its motion to stay, and ordered GWA by Wednesday to file proper forms and proposed schedules, discovery plans, and orders for the court’s judgment.

GWA plays race card

In its January 4, 2022 request to the Guam Supreme Court, GWA made a parenthetical notation toward the end of its argument to qualify CTI’s status as a private landowner: “far removed from an ancestral landowner.”

An “ancestral landowner’ is a person who has a claim to land condemned by the U.S. Navy in 1950 and prior, and that has been returned or is anticipated to be returned to the government of Guam. In all instances, those original landowners were Chamorro.

GWA and its attorneys believe Ms. Iriarte misapplied certain local laws, including the law that created the Guam Ancestral Lands Commission. While the contention is that the judge misapplied language contained in the ancestral lands statute, no where in the case is the racial makeup of CTI’s ownership and management, or whether CTI is an ancestral lands claimant a matter under dispute… except in GWA’s own petition to the Guam Supreme Court.

GWA’s general manager, Miguel Bordallo, does not reply to Kandit’s requests for comment.