A Guam family trying to get back ownership of the former Tropicana Hotel property in Tumon has sued the real estate agent, who brokered its sale to a shell corporation associated with Philippine billionaire Dr. Lucio Tan.

The lawsuit, filed in the Superior Court of Guam December 30, 2021, alleges realtor Ramona Cepeda Siblang conspired with her client – Mary Leon Guerrero – to defraud, steal, and launder money.

Who is Mary Leon Guerrero?

Mary is the widow of Greg Leon Guerrero. They have an adult son: Collin. Greg had three siblings: Peter, Rita L.G. Toves, and the late Bernadette L.G. Vandergrift. Greg, Peter, Rita, and Bernadette’s parents – Pedro and Vicente – owned a one-third undivided interest in the land underneath the former Tropicana (now Guam Beachfront Residences in Tumon).

What was allegedly stolen? What went down?

In short: Land; very valuable land. And money: $2.5 million Mary and Collin received from the sale of that very valuable one-third interest in the land underneath the Tropicana. Here is the sequence of events, facts, and allegations:

1. Pedro and Vicenta, and the families of Pedro’s two siblings who owned the remaining two-thirds interest of the Tropicana property, leased the land to the developer of what would become the Tropicana Hotel in 1972. The lease is for 90 years, expiring in 2062, with escalating rent payments every decade or so. The company that now owns Guam Beachfront Residences – Grandview Corporation (a sister shell company to Columbus Development– both affiliated with Dr. Tan) was paying $1,000 a month in rent for Pedro and Vicenta’s portion of the land by 2019.
2. Pedro and Vicenta died in their old age in 1994. Without his siblings’s knowledge, Greg formed a corporation – ULG, Inc. – and assigned himself 1,498 out of 1,500 shares of the company’s stock one year prior to their parents’s death. Pedro and Vicenta’s land interest was placed under ULG. The other two shares he gave to his first cousins: Pamela L.G. Sahagun and Anthony Leon Guerrero.
3. From 1993 until Greg’s death in 2013, Greg kept the monthly lease payments paid to ULG, and did not share any of the proceeds with his siblings. When Greg died, his 1,498 shares were divided equally between Mary and Collin.
4. Greg left a tax debt upon his death. His widow, Mary, allegedly informed her brother-in-law, Peter, of the debt, and Peter supposedly paid that debt. Mary, however, alleged the debt was paid from the proceeds of the sale of her home in Washington state.
5. According to documents signed by both Mary and Collin, some of which (in relevant part) were signed by Pamela and Anthony, and filed at the Guam Department of Revenue and Taxation, on October 15, 2018, Mary, Collin, Pamela, and Anthony had all reassigned their shares in ULG so that the stocks were shared as follows: Peter with 25 percent, Rita with 25 percent, Bernadette with 25 percent, and Mary with 25 percent. Mary and Collin, in their depositions, alleged they did not know what they were signing.
6. The following year, in 2019, Mary sought to sell the land interest. She retained The Property Shop, where Ramona Siblang worked as a real estate agent. By the Fall of 2019, according to allegations made by Peter, Rita, and the estate of Bernadette, Mary and Ramona had engaged Columbus Development Corporation to sell the land interest to that company.
7. On October 8, 2019, Mary and Ramona held a conference call with Rita and Bernadette, where Mary allegedly asked whether they approved of selling the land. According to Rita and the estate of Bernadette, Rita agreed, but Bernadette did not. According to Ramona, she was under the impression Mary was simply asking Rita and Bernadette for their permission to sell the land as a courtesy, and not as a requirement. The conversation, according to AT&T phone records, lasted 78 minutes.
8. On November 1, 2019, in Washington state, Peter, Rita, and Bernadette (Mary was on Guam) convened a meeting of the ULG board of directors, re-electing Peter as president and treasurer of ULG, and Mary as secretary. Certified public accountant Steven Finley prepared the meeting summary and emailed it to Mary on November 6. Mary, under deposition, could not recall the email.
9. A purchase agreement dated November 4, 2019 indicates Mary offered to sell the land interest for $2.5 million to Columbus. Ramona signed the offer as Mary’s broker.
10. On November 12 and 13, 2019, Mary and Ramona went to the Department of Revenue and Taxation to examine ULG’s filings. Those documents showed ULG was owned by Peter, Rita, Bernadette, and Mary, and that Mary could not possibly have made a decision to sell the land without the agreement of two of the others.
11. According to Ramona, she advised Mary to retain legal counsel. According to both Mary and Ramona, Mary hired attorney Gary Gumataotao. According to Mary, her attorney advised her that Peter, Rita and Bernadette fraudulently hijacked ULG from Mary. According to Mary, her attorney prepared several sets of documents that would set into motion a return of the company to Mary and Collin.
12. Without filing any criminal complaint or civil lawsuit to settle the dispute Mary had with Peter, Rita, and Bernadette, Mary on November 29, 2019, purporting to act as ULG’s president and treasurer, signed and filed with the DRT a 2019 Annual Report, which stated that ULG’s shares are owned 749 each by Mary and Collin, and one each by Pamela and Anthony. Peter, Rita, and Bernadette all were unaware of what Mary did.
13. On that same day, Mary executed a corporate resolution signed by herself and Collin approving the sale of the property interest to Columbus for $2.5 million. Again, her in-laws were unaware of the action.
14. On that same day, Ramona transferred that corporate resolution to her friend, Lou San Nicolas, who was the escrow officer at Pacific American Title and Insurance Company (PATICO).
15. On December 13, and without Peter, Rita, or Bernadette’s knowledge, Mary signed a warranty deed purporting to transfer legal title to ULG’s interest in the properties to Columbus.
16. On that same day, $2,321,003.74 was wired into Mary’s personal account at Coast 360 Federal Credit Union. In her deposition, Mary said she did not share any of that money with her in-laws because she was the rightful owner of ULG, despite the documents of ownership that existed prior to the unilateral change she made.

 

Peter, Rita, and Bernadette eventually found out what happened, and by the following year sued Mary, Collin, Pamela, Anthony, Lou San Nicolas, PATICO, Columbus, and two Columbus officials: Phil Schrage and Alex Lim. Schrage has been known to be the general manager of the Micronesia Mall. Bernadette died in 2020. They did not sue Ramona in that particular lawsuit.

During the discovery phase of the 2020 lawsuit and following depositions taken from several parties, a series of emails and WhatsApp messages were discovered, showing Ramona was much more involved in the events of the allegedly fraudulent sale than it originally appeared. That evidence led to further depositions, where inconsistencies between Ramona and Mary’s recollection of events began to emerge.

In a November 2021 interview with Kandit, Ms. Siblang said she was not involved in any illegal conspiracy, if one existed. She referred to the fact that – at the time – she was not party to the lawsuit, as evidence she was not involved in any wrongdoing.

On December 30, 2021, however, that changed, when Peter, Rita, and the estate of Bernadette sued Ramona, Mary, and Collin to recover the property interest and all of the money Mary, Collin, and Ramona made.

What money?

According to the latest lawsuit:

• “Columbus paid $2.5 million for ULG’s one-third interest in the properties, of which $2,321,003.74 was wired on December 13, 2019 to Mary’s personal bank account at Coast 360 FCU.”
• “Property Shop, Phil Law, and Ramona were paid a $175,000 commission for acting as Mary’s real estate agent in connection with the fraudulent conveyance of ULG’s interest in the properties to Columbus.”
• “Mary was not entitled to keep the $2,321,003.74 Columbus paid for ULG’s interest in the properties for herself.”
• “Even so, shortly after the sale closed, Mary engaged in a series of fraudulent transactions aimed at hiding the money that Columbus paid to her individually for ULG’s interest in the properties to put it beyond the reach of ULG, Peter, Rita, and the Estate of Bernadette. For example, Mary immediately transferred half of the sale proceeds to Collin, even though he was not entitled to any of the money either.”
• “In addition, Mary supposedly used $300,000 of the proceeds from the sale of ULG’s interest in the properties to buy life insurance coverage, Policy No. 150187853, from Midland National Life Insurance Company.” Ramona, purportedly as the Midland agent, sold that policy to Mary.
• “Of the money transferred to him by Mary, Collin supposedly used $300,000 to buy himself a similar life insurance policy from Ramona and Midland. At the time of the purchase, Collin was 27 years old.”
• “Collin has admitted that he also used some of the money to purchase several vehicles.”
• “Ramona, in addition to acting as Mary’s real estate agent in the illegal transfer of ULG’s interest in the properties to Columbus, sold the Midland insurance policies to Mary and Collin, and presumably collected the two $300,000 lump-sum premiums that Mary and Collin paid when they applied for the policies on or about January 7, 2020, just 25 days after the fraudulent conveyance of ULG’s interest in the properties to Columbus. Ramona, as the soliciting agent for Midland, received a commission from Mary and Collin respectively.”
• “Ramona also sold Mary $20,000 in stock from Mace Corporation, a private startup company, as another vehicle to hide some of the proceeds Columbus paid to Mary for ULG’s interest in the properties. Ramona was paid a commission on that sale as well.
• The lawsuit, which is civil in nature, makes allegations of criminal wrongdoing against the three named defendants, Ramona, Mary and Collin:
• “Mary Collin, and Ramona voluntarily and willfully conspired and carried out a series of transactions, including (1) Mary’s transfer to Collin of half of the money paid by Columbus to Mary, (2) Mary and Collin’s transfer of $300,000 each to Ramona and Midland, and (3) Mary’s purchase of $20,000 of stock in a private company from Ramona, with an actual intent to delay or defraud ULG and the other Plaintiffs with regard to their demands against Mary as to the proceeds of the sale of ULG’s interest in the properties to Columbus. In making and receiving those transfers and others, the defendants knew that they were made with a view to preventing the money from the sale of ULG’s interest in the properties from coming to ULG and the other Plaintiffs.”

What types of crimes are alleged here?

Fraud

According to federal law at 18 USC §1341 (Frauds and swindles), “Whoever, having devised or intending to devise any scheme or artifice to defraud, or for obtaining money or property by means of false or fraudulent pretenses, representations, or promises, or to sell, dispose of, loan, exchange, alter, give away, distribute, supply, or furnish or procure for unlawful use any counterfeit or spurious coin, obligation, security, or other article, or anything represented to be or intimated or held out to be such counterfeit or spurious article, for the purpose of executing such scheme or artifice or attempting so to do, places in any post office or authorized depository for mail matter, any matter or thing whatever to be sent or delivered by the Postal Service, or deposits or causes to be deposited any matter or thing whatever to be sent or delivered by any private or commercial interstate carrier, or takes or receives therefrom, any such matter or thing, or knowingly causes to be delivered by mail or such carrier according to the direction thereon, or at the place at which it is directed to be delivered by the person to whom it is addressed, any such matter or thing, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than 20 years, or both.”

Wire fraud

A couple sections of federal law down the page, Congress explains wire fraud: “Whoever, having devised or intending to devise any scheme or artifice to defraud, or for obtaining money or property by means of false or fraudulent pretenses, representations, or promises, transmits or causes to be transmitted by means of wire, radio, or television communication in interstate or foreign commerce, any writings, signs, signals, pictures, or sounds for the purpose of executing such scheme or artifice, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than 20 years, or both.”

Bank fraud

One section of federal law later, Congress defines bank fraud and caps imprisonment for anyone convicted of the crime at 30 years. In part, 18 USC §1344 states:

Whoever knowingly executes, or attempts to execute, a scheme or artifice–

(1)  to defraud a financial institution; or

(2)  to obtain any of the moneys, funds, credits, assets, securities or other property owned by, or under the custody or control of, a financial institution, by means of false or fraudulent pretenses, representations, or promises;

shall be fined not more than $1,000,000 or imprisoned not more than 30 years, or both.

Money laundering

(‘Laundering of monetary instruments’ actually is the real term)

And, finally, federal law defines money laundering – in part – as this: “Whoever, knowing that the property involved in a financial transaction represents the proceeds of some form of unlawful activity, conducts or attempts to conduct such a financial transaction which in fact involves the proceeds of specified unlawful activity … knowing that the transaction is designed in whole or in part to conceal or disguise the nature, the location, the source, the ownership, or the control of the proceeds of specified unlawful activity; or to avoid a transaction reporting requirement under State or Federal law, shall be sentenced to a fine of not more than $500,000 or twice the value of the property involved in the transaction, whichever is greater, or imprisonment for not more than twenty years, or both.”