DC Circuit Should Reject Sandwich Isles Mandamus Request on USF Payments, FCC Says
The FCC urged a court to throw out a Sandwich Isles Communications mandamus request to order the agency to disburse USF subsidies withheld from the carrier since July 2015. "The extraordinary relief sought by SIC is entirely unwarranted," given "ample"…
Sign up for a free preview to unlock the rest of this article
Export Compliance Daily combines U.S. export control news, foreign border import regulation and policy developments into a single daily information service that reliably informs its trade professional readers about important current issues affecting their operations.
legal discretion "to deny subsidies to companies like SIC that engage in fraud, waste, or abuse" in the USF program, said an opposition filed Tuesday with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit (In re Sandwich Isles v. FCC, No. 17-1248). The FCC said a jury in July 2015 convicted CEO Albert Hee of tax fraud, citing evidence he authorized using millions of dollars in corporate funds to pay personal expenses. The commission said its investigations found that SIC improperly received more than $27 million in USF payments in 2002-2015 and "improperly recouped" from the fund more than $6.7 million in "inflated" management fees for Hee family expenses. The FCC said it would lift the suspension of USF payments only after it determines how SIC will reimburse the fund, something the company "has not yet indicated." The SIC request doesn't meet mandamus standards and should be dismissed for lack of jurisdiction or denied for lacking "compelling equitable grounds," the agency said. SIC didn't comment Thursday. Another FCC filing last week disputed Sandwich Isles' bid to recover more than an estimated $1.9 million in annual costs from a National Exchange Carrier Association pooling mechanism (see 1801190059).