PEOPLE of the Territory of Guam, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Joseph B. CRUZ, Defendant-Appellant

ORDER

The memorandum disposition filed July 24, 1995, as amended is redesignated as an authored opinion by Judge Trott.

OPINION

The sole issue raised by Joseph B. Cruz (“Cruz”) is whether the evidence is sufficient to support his various convictions in the Superior Court of Guam for crimes arising from a scheme to steal land belonging to the Territory of Guam. We have jurisdiction over this timely appeal pursuant to 48 U.S.C. § 1424-3 (c), and we affirm the Appellate Division’s decision.

I

BACKGROUND

Cruz worked at the Guam Department of Land Management as the Land Administrator. He is a first cousin to one of his code-fendants, Thomas Anderson, a surveyor. With Cruz’s assistance, Anderson succeeded in creating fictitious title to various unsur-veyed plots of government land. Specifically, Cruz supplied Anderson with fraudulent lot numbers and fake “escaped assessment” tax records from the Department of Revenue and Taxation. An “escaped assessment” refers to a retroactive tax assessment for a particular lot which has escaped tax assessment in previous years. Cruz secured these escaped assessments from Vincent Cruz (no relation) of the Real Property Tax Branch of the…