{"id":23591,"date":"2021-10-15T13:30:28","date_gmt":"2021-10-15T16:30:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/?p=23591"},"modified":"2026-04-23T14:45:53","modified_gmt":"2026-04-23T17:45:53","slug":"ipi-complies-with-court-order-in-lawsuit-filed-by-former-employee","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/ipi-complies-with-court-order-in-lawsuit-filed-by-former-employee","title":{"rendered":"IPI complies with court order in lawsuit filed by former employee"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

IPI has finally complied with a federal court order and made payments for a lawsuit filed by a former IPI employee who alleged discrimination.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

Northern Mariana Islands.-\u00a0Imperial Pacific International<\/a>\u00a0has paid sanctions imposed by the federal court in\u00a0a lawsuit brought by a former IPI employee alleging discrimination<\/strong>. The compliance means it avoids the imprisonment of officials.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Former IPI’s employee,\u00a0Joshua Gray had sued the company for sexual harassment<\/strong>. Gray’s lawyer, William Fitzgerald, notified the court that as of yesterday, IPI had paid Gray’s lawyer’s fees and expenses of US$19,616.25 in full, thus clearing its charge of contempt.\u00a0IPI’s lawyer Stephen Nutting said the payment was made before the deadline<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

IPI made the first payment after the performance reasons hearing on October 7, when the court initially reconfirmed it was in contempt of court.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

IPI\u2019s second payment was issued on October 11<\/strong>, amounting to US$13,000, fully paying for the sanctions imposed by the court to lift the contempt order against the casino operator.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Chief Judge Ramona V. Manglona of the District Court for the NMI<\/strong> had stated in a written order that if the casino operator failed to comply with the fee order, officials could be subject to severe sanctions<\/strong> including “incarceration of three days until the contempt is cured.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

IPI casino licence fee available for appropriation<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

In a letter sent to the Legislature<\/a>, Governor Ralph DLG Torres has stated that the remaining US$8m of the US$15m annual licence fee that Imperial International paid <\/strong>before the Covid-19 pandemic is now available.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Of the amount now available for appropriation, Torres said U$6m will be for Saipan<\/strong>, US$1m will be for Tinian and US$1mwill be for Rota. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Torres stated: \u201cI hope that these funds will be used for the purposes of enhancing the missions and goals of Northern Marianas College as part of our Commonwealth\u2019s efforts to build our local workforce.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

IPI has seen its gaming licence suspended indefinitely<\/a> after it failed to comply with regulatory orders. The company violated five orders <\/strong>including a failure to pay its US$3.1m annual regulatory fee <\/strong>in 2020 and failure to comply with an order to settle debts<\/strong> with vendors.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

IPI has finally complied with a federal court order and made payments for a lawsuit filed by a former IPI employee who alleged discrimination.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":176,"featured_media":19434,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"is_press_release":false,"is_interview":false,"is_opinion":false,"focusai_summary":"Imperial Pacific International (IPI) has complied with a federal court order, settling a discrimination lawsuit by a former employee and paying associated sanctions and legal fees, thereby avoiding further contempt charges. Concurrently, US$8 million from IPI's pre-pandemic annual license fee is now available for appropriation by the Northern Mariana Islands Legislature, earmarked for workforce development. This development occurs while IPI's gaming license remains indefinitely suspended due to persistent regulatory non-compliance, including unpaid fees and vendor debts.","focusai_entities":"Imperial Pacific International, IPI, Joshua Gray, William Fitzgerald, Stephen Nutting, Ramona V. Manglona, Ralph DLG Torres, Northern Marianas College","focusai_location":"Northern Mariana Islands, Saipan, Tinian, Rota","focusai_target_profile":"ceo_executive (0.9), regulator (1.0), compliance_legal (1.0), operator_casino (0.9), investor_analyst (0.9), supplier_vendor (0.8), journalist_researcher (0.9)","focusai_suggestions":[{"label":"IPI License Reinstatement?","query":"What specific conditions and financial commitments would Imperial Pacific International need to fulfill to initiate a process for gaming license reinstatement in the Northern Mariana Islands, and what is the estimated timeline for such a complex regulatory remediation?"},{"label":"NMI Regulatory Impact?","query":"How will the NMI Legislature's appropriation of IPI's license fee impact the territory's gaming regulatory framework and its approach to attracting and overseeing future integrated resort developments, particularly concerning financial stability and compliance enforcement?"}],"footnotes":""},"categories":[16336,156],"tags":[14213,22674],"class_list":["post-23591","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-australasia-news","category-regulation-news","tag-imperial-pacific","tag-ipi"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23591","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/176"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23591"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23591\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":23605,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23591\/revisions\/23605"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/19434"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23591"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23591"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23591"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}