By Gina Tabonares
Variety News Staff

Naming her division heads was the first item on the agenda for Attorney General Alicia Limtiaco, as she appointed at least three men from her transition team on her first day of office.
In her first press conference held in the Justice Building, Limtiaco said that she started buckling down to work as early as January 1 after she took the oath as the next Guam attorney general.
To make things work faster, she appointed Alberto Tolentino as Chief Deputy Attorney General to replace Joseph Guthrie, Phil Tydingco as the new Chief Prosecutor replacing Fred Canover and J. Patrick Mason as head of Civil Litigation.
Tolentino, an ethics prosecutor, was touted as a controversial appointee because former AG Douglas Moylan questioned his connection with two of the defendants who were recently charged in a criminal case for an alleged theft at Guam Power Authority.
Tydingco is the former chief prosecutor of the Public Defender’s Office while Mason practiced civil litigation, appellate, commercial and business law at Carlsmith Ball LLP.
Limtiaco also established an on-call prosecutor system which will allow the public to access the help of an AG lawyer 24 hours a day.
She designated Deputy Attorney General Dianne Corbett and Deputy Attorney General Clyde Lemons to oversee the program that took effect at midnight.
Limtiaco’s first hours in office were spent reviewing records and documents of the AG’s office and meeting with personnel and staff .
“There is a lot of work to do but the staff is very cooperative and helpful in the transition and I am glad we are moving forward,” Limtiaco told Variety.
Taking lunch at 3:30 p.m., Limtiaco was in an office that is a picture of disarray with temporary installations of office equipment and labeled boxes meant to go in and out of the building.
In addition to the heavy tasks in the AG’s office, Limtiaco is also preparing to leave for Washington D.C. today to attend the oral arguments on the bond borrowing case filed by Moylan before the U.S. Supreme Court.
Limtiaco will be off-island until January 10. She will be at the hearing on January 8 and will meet federal officers of National Office of Child Support Enforcement, the Department of Justice and the Homeland Security Department to talk about professional relationships with their local counterparts.
She lamented that she did not see the actual brief and reply submitted earlier by the former AG but she is hopeful that she will get enough time to sit down with the Washington D.C. lawyers to prepare her for the court proceedings.
Moylan through a Washington D.C. law firm, Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale and Dorr LLP, sought a reversal of the Guam Supreme Court ruling in the Ninth Circuit which eliminated jurisdiction over the case after Congress enacted the Guam Organic Act that prevents the circuit court from modifing any judgment of the local high court.
Limtiaco said she is in good communication with the law firm that is set to brief her as soon as she arrives in Washington D.C.
She said she will not take the stand to argue but her presence in the court is important because she is representing the people of Guam.