By Jac Perry
GUAM - COLA recipients flooded banks and credit unions to deposit and cash their long-awaited COLA benefit checks this week. While recipients are grateful for the checks finally being distributed, some expressed disappointment when realizing the amount of money taken from their awards to pay their lawyer
One daughter of a deceased recipient had this to say: “We are shocked with the amount they took for the attorneys. Guam’s manamko’ need this money for medical and other bills and they have been waiting so long for this money. My mother died waiting for this. Many are sick and are going through medical treatment off-island or have terminal illnesses with bills piling up and need every penny to make ends meet. They also are trying to pay for their past bills and new ones that come in, so this money, especially with the attorney’s fees taken out, will not last long,” Angel Wusstig said. Wusstig is the daughter of a COLA recipient who passed away from pancreatic cancer 10 years ago. Her father is the surviving recipient.
Wusstig said she, her father or other family members had never met the attorney hired to handle the class action suit that forced judgment for COLA payment.
“Maybe the attorney should have asked for something less than 10 percent in this case or should have instead only been paid for the hours he worked for the case. These people are all elderly and need their money. This is their golden years and they should enjoy their hard earned money without having so much taken out for attorney fees," Wusstig said.
While finally receiving COLA payments would have been a great relief for the almost 5,000 original COLA recipients, more than half of the people owed this money have already died. The remaining number of original COLA recipients is barely 2,100, and the rest of the checks will go to survivors or estates.
A court order in January affirmed COLA class action attorney Michael Phillips would receive his contractual agreement compensation of 10 percent of the total award for payments after the judgment. The past due awards owed totaled $92 million.
Attached is a copy of a COLA check stub illustrating the amount removed from the award to pay attorney's fees. The check recipent's identity has been protected at their request.
Guam News Factor will follow up with a story on how the attorney's fees were derived so that COLA recipients will know why they paid their attorney so much of the COLA money they earned and waited years to receive.
John Dela Rosa contributed to this story.
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