Nick Reyes
Chuilian Fu
AFTER receiving instructions from Superior Court Judge Teresa Kim-Tenorio, jurors began deliberations on Tuesday in the trial of former Chief of Parole Nick Reyes and F&S Corporation owner Chuilian Fu, who are charged with conspiracy to commit misconduct in public office, conspiracy to commit theft by deception, and theft by deception. They have denied the charges.
According to the information filed by the Office of the Attorney General in Superior Court, on or about Oct. 4, 2022, Reyes agreed with Fu “that one or both would engage in or solicit theft of property by deception, to wit, the construction of a patio at the Parole Office purported to be constructed by a tailoring company owned by Chuilian Fu’s F&S Corporation in the amount of $9,997.80, but actually constructed by uncompensated labor performed by parolees under the direction of…Reyes.”
The jury trial started on April 7.
In their closing remarks, the defense argued that the prosecution failed to present testimony or evidence proving their clients’ guilt beyond a reasonable doubt.
Attorney Anthony Aguon, who represents Fu, said, “Bad investigation led to bad information.”
“If you have a purchase order, isn’t the first person you would check is the decision-maker? The prosecution did not call any of the decision-makers. We did and asked [one of them] what happened. He said he made an investigation and determined that there was a clerical error.”
Aguon added that the prosecution also failed to call the individual who processed the purchase order to testify.
“Why would Mr. Fu ask to get paid for work he didn’t do? That does not make sense,” Aguon said.
“There [are] too many problems with this prosecution. Their witness said one thing, their investigator said another [and] the investigation report said another. There’s no evidence of purpose that my client obtained the property of another through deception. He did the work. He is waiting to get paid for it. Conspiracy? Was there an agreement between Mr. Fu and Mr. Reyes to commit a crime? Where is the evidence?”
Attorney Joaquin Torres, who represents Reyes, said, “The government benefitted from this mistake. Mr. Reyes did not benefit; Mr. Fu did not benefit.”
“All government witnesses testified that Mr. Fu did the work, and there is also no question that Mr. Fu did not get paid,” Torres said.
“All the witnesses from Finance and Procurement said the purchase order went through, and procurement procedure was followed, and Mr. Reyes never called them,” Torres added.
“The government did not know there were two pala-pala [patio] projects at the Board of Parole office. Their chief investigator did not know there were two projects, and that is the problem. Bad investigation leads to this kind of prosecution,” Torres said.
For his part, the prosecutor, Assistant Attorney General James Robert Kingman, asked the jury to examine the evidence and testimonies presented in court.
“These pieces of evidence tell a story,” Kingman said. “It’s up to you to determine what gives weight to the legitimacy of those purchase orders, invoices, and checks,” he added.
“You heard testimony from [a] Finance employee that the purchase order has no supporting documents that are required, and [so they] called the Parole Office…. Mr. Jason Lizama, who, during the construction project, was officer-in-charge…, thought that there’s a purchase order for the pala-pala that he had already supervised the construction of with [the] parolees,” Kingman said.
The jurors will continue their deliberations today, Wednesday.
