Micronesians File massive suit

Transpac, Mr Echols, Mr Penrose, and counsel for Transpac, Mr James White, were named in a multi million dollar suit filed in the TT High Court by five Micronesian stockholders in Transpac—Pedro R.

Deleon Guerrero, Antonio L. Tai sacan, Jesus A. Sonoda, Segundo T.

Sablan and Ermas Ngiraelbaed.

They alleged that Echols can celled the charter and purchase operation on two vessels, highly adapted to inter-island service, previously chartered by MILI, re sulting in a loss of $4 million: and that he fraudulently and negligently caused the cancellation of the Mathias Reith and Grette Reith charters, and probably a third ship, the Lotte Reith, would be taken off charter, resulting in the loss of the ship and an option to purchase.

The plaintiffs alleged that all three ships were chartered for about $5OO a day, then above the average mar ket rate, but now the going rate had increased above that, and the loss of the charter under the old agreement had resulted in a direct financial loss for the company of $1.5 million.

They also alleged that the officials of Transpac, Echols in particular, used Transpac money to provide junkets for relatives of employees, with no resulting benefit to the company.

Another claim was that, as Echols had taken away the power of the members of the board, the company had lost $2,5 million in profits.

In another count against Echols, they alleged Transpac practised dis crimination in employment prac tices, and cited an example of a Micronesian, who applied for the post of assistant operations manager, and was not considered. Because of the discriminate hiring policy, the company lost $125,000.

The plaintiffs claim $8,132,000 from Echols.

They allege that Transpac, through White’s negligence, lost $250,000 through increased court actions against the shipping line, and demanded he pay back that amount.

Penrose was accused of false statements to the Rate Review Board about container use, and the claim against him is for $500,000.