Ponzi defendant
challenges court’s authority
A Laie woman being retried for defrauding $67 million from 5,000 investors in a Cayman Islands investment scheme represented herself at trial in federal court yesterday.
"I have an attorney: God," Montez Salamasina Tuia Ottley, 59, told visiting U.S. District Judge Manuel Real.
She waived her right to a jury trial on wire and mail fraud, and money-laundering charges and continued to argue that the court had no jurisdiction to try her again.
"It's nothing but a fraud," Ottley said about yesterday's proceedings.
The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals threw out Ottley's February 2002 conviction in May and ordered a new trial, saying the court should have allowed her to serve as her own counsel at trial.
Ottley told Real that she is not under the court's jurisdiction because she is a citizen of the kingdom of God and of the Hawaiian kingdom and she answers only to her deity.
"He's the judge in this courtroom, not you," she told Real, pointing a finger at him.
She described federal prosecutors and their agents as "liars, thieves and murderers" and "slimeballs" who hide behind the law, saying they have no evidence against her.
"There's a stench smell in this courtroom. It's venomous and malicious," she said.
Ottley is accused of being the mastermind of the program that promised 8 percent returns weekly over 13 weeks for a minimum investment of $1,000.
Witnesses for the government testified yesterday that interest payments were paid out of money collected from new investors, a classic Ponzi scheme. They said individuals could earn an additional 3 percent for bringing others into the program.
Witnesses said they were happy with the program and benefited from it until it was shut down.
One American Samoa investor said his group invested $480,000 and lost $200,000 but felt Ottley had "done something for the people."
Another investor, who said she earned $3,940 over the 13 weeks, testified she didn't believe Ottley meant to hurt her.
Ottley said a partner in the program, Paul Lazzaro, was the one who received all the money and wired it to the Cayman Islands.
Lazzaro pleaded guilty to wire and mail fraud in the case.
