Category Archives: Hawaiian issues

Claims of “fake news” miss the mark in mortgage relief fraud allegations

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Here’s the headline on a press release posted on the “Hawaiian Kingdom Blog,” which describes itself as “Weblog of the acting government of the Hawaiian Kingdom presently operating within the occupied State of the Hawaiian Islands:”

Press Release: Dr. Keanu Sai Being a Subject of Ad Hominem Attack by KGMB Unconfirmed “Fake News” Report

The press release was issued in response to a Hawaii News Now story broadcast on June 10: “State alleges Hawaiian scholar with a troubled past bilked distressed homeowners.”

According to HNN:

The state Office of Consumer Protection has made a criminal referral for controversial Hawaiian scholar David Keanu Sai, saying he has committed a felony.
In a court filing, OCP attorney James Evers said Sai violated the state’s Mortgage Rescue Fraud Prevention Act by taking nearly $8,000 in advance fees from distressed homeowners.

“Sai’s conduct constitutes a felony and Sai’s criminal wrongdoing has been referred to the proper criminal authorities for investigation,” Evers wrote.

The criminal referral came from a foreclosure case involving a property in Ewa Beach. The owners lost their home.

I previously blogged about the court proceedings in which the state’s Office of Consumer Protection accused David Keanu Sai, who purports to speak for the Hawaiian Kingdom, and two others of participating in an illegal mortgage rescue fraud, and was quoted briefly in the HNN story.

See:

May 11, 2019: Two sovereignty advocates hit with allegations of mortgage rescue fraud

May 13, 2019: Keanu Sai claimed “diplomatic immunity” shielded him from fraud allegations

Just a few brief comments on the “Hawaiian Kingdom” press release, which is really one of those non-denial denials.

The Kingdom does not deny the important parts of the story, including that the Office of Consumer Protection believes there were numerous violations of Hawaii’s Mortgage Rescue Fraud Prevention Act, a criminal referral was made by OCP regarding this allegedly illegal mortgage rescue scheme, and that violations of the Hawaii’s Mortgage Rescue Fraud Prevention Act are punishable as Class C felonies.

Instead, the press release makes several arguments.

First: The Office of Consumer Protection “…falsely represented to the Court that Dr. Sai and the family had no written contract.”

Second: “The contract did not involve any foreclosure or mortgage issue.”

Third: The proceedings in which the Office of Consumer Protection allegations were made was dismissed by Judge Jeffrey, so “Case over!”

Now I’ll evaluate their arguments.

First, the Office of Consumer Protection did not say that Keanu Sai did not have a contract with the family facing foreclosure. It clearly and repeatedly stated that Sai’s contract did not comply with the requirements of the Mortgage Rescue Fraud Prevention Act in important respects, including demanding a fee in advance of services, failing to spell out exactly what services would be rendered, failing to disclose the actual costs, and failing to disclose that the no foreclosure case has ever been stopped as a result of Sai’s jurisdictional argument.

OCP spelled out the various alleged violations of law by Sai and others involved (see pages 5-7 of this OCP memo citing specific provisions of law it believes were violated).

Second, the contract certainly did involve a foreclosure matter. The contract states: “The purpose of this agreement is to procure the services of the consultant in relation to the client’s property at 91-330 Ewa Beach Road, Ewa Beach, HI 96706.”

Further, the court record includes the sworn declarations of the homeowners, who describe how they were told that their home could be saved from foreclosure using Sai’s arguments about Hawaiian sovereignty and what they were told is the lack of jurisdiction of Hawaii courts over these land issues.

And, third, the dismissal of the foreclosure proceedings is certainly not the end of the allegations brought by the Office of Consumer Protection. As mentioned earlier, the press release does not deny that OCP disclosed it had referred the matter for criminal investigation. The referral was necessary because OCP is a civil agency that is not empowered to pursue criminal charges. But when it finds what it believes are criminal violations, it can refer those to the proper authorities.

In this case, OCP said it believes both federal and state laws were being violated.

Oh, and dismissing this as an “Ad Hominem Attack” would be funny if it weren’t so misleading.

An ad hominem argument is “directed against a person rather than the position they are maintaining.” The allegations by the Office of Consumer Protect were clearly targeting the acts of Sai and others that were believed to be violations of law. That’s a long way from an ad hominem attack.

Anyway, the fun and games continue.

News of OHA “takeover” shows shallowness of reporting on Hawaiian issues

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In the wake of last month’s attempted takeover of the Office of Hawaiian Affairs headquarters by a dozen men claiming to represent the Kauai-based “Polynesian Kingdom of Atooi,” Hawaii Public Radio broadcast a follow-up story under the headline, “Who Speaks for Native Hawaiians?”

HPR explained:

Last week’s arrest of members of a Hawaiian sovereignty group brought up an often asked question in the Hawaiian community, “Who exactly speaks for native Hawaiians?”

But am I the only one who thinks this was a very poor question to pose?

Would you ask this same question about other ethnic groups?

“Who exactly speaks for Haoles?” Or “Who speaks for Japanese?”

For a variety of reasons, those questions wouldn’t fly.

And when the questions were put to Hawaiians by HPR, it led nowhere, except that the question is hard to answer. As the leader of one organization told HPR, “…there are oftentimes challenges to any one entity’s ability to adequately represent such a diverse native Hawaiian community.”

Exactly.

My sense is that the question only seemed appropriate because there’s so little reporting on the Hawaiian community that the public doesn’t really know much at all about the influential institutions, organizations, and individuals, the issues at play, and the dynamics within and between interest groups. It’s all opaque, as far as the media, and the public, are concerned.

It might have been more useful, from the public’s perspective, to begin with the Kingdom of Atooi and the other ten or more organizations claiming to speak on behalf of some form of a resurrected or reestablished Hawaiian Kingdom. What are the groups? What’s the basis for their claims to legitimacy, their claim to fame and following? Who are their leaders and what are their qualifications? What are their beliefs? What policies do they advocate? Who listens to them, if anyone at all outside their respective inner circles? How large is their audience? And then, as good reporters should be doing, we need to put those claims to the test. Are they basically products of the fertile imaginations of charismatic leaders? If they are hereditary claims, again they must be tested. At this point in time, if someone claims to be descended from an alii family, what’s the evidence to support the claim? And if it seems to hold up, is there anything to separate that self-appointed leader from the many hundreds or thousands of people able to claim similar ancestral roots? And why should it be assumed that a modern reincarnation of a sovereign Hawaiian governing entity would be based on a hereditary model anyway? That seems quite unlikely in this modern world.

Alternately, it would be helpful to return to the list of organizations and individuals who joined in a statement criticizing the “Kingdom of Atooi” for its actions at OHA, and also criticizing authorities for not appearing to take the violent actions and threats seriously. How about ongoing reporting of what’s going on within those groups, the work they do, the actions they are taking every day, the issues and debates within and between them, etc. The kinds of things we need to know to understand the fascinating complexity of the social world we find ourselves in.

Of course, Hawaiian organizations are not the only ones that aren’t getting any news coverage these days. Government reporting has also declined dramatically. Business reporting has mostly disappeared. Labor unions have long been largely ignored by the mainstream media. Most news media have cut back so much they can no longer sustain traditional “beats,” where reporters would build up the contacts and experience necessary to report meaningfully on events.

Fewer reporters, lots of issues to cover, minimal resources, and continuing news cutbacks.

Throwback Thursday: “Stop the bombing” 1976

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Before the Protect Kahoolawe Ohana was formed, there was Gail Kawaipuna Prejean and the Hawaiian Coalition of Native Claims, which designed and distributed this small poster following the first protest landing on Kahoolawe in January 1976.

It memorializes the “Kahoolawe Nine” who took part in that short-lived landing on the island.

I was able to locate my original copy of the poster yesterday after getting a request from a student at the University of California San Diego for a more legible copy than a version I had posted years ago. Luckily, my iPhone photo turned out to be quite legible.

The 1885 Honolulu telephone “book”

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The “Official List of Subscribers, Honolulu Bell Telephone Company” is Honolulu’s 1885 telephone “book”, a single sheet of paper with 401 printed names and numbers, with another 16 penciled in at the end. Honolulu’s fledgling telephone system put it among the leading cities of the world at the time.

The subscribers list is part of the current major exhibition at the Honolulu Museum of Art, “Hooulu Hawaii: The King Kalakaua Era.” It runs through January 27, 2019.

The telephone list is an amazing document that reflects the makeup of Honolulu society at the time, sort of a Who’s Who of the growing city. Phone #1 was the Pilots’ Office, which I presume refers to the harbor pilot. Phone #2 was “Oceanic SS Co.,” which would be the Oceanic Steamship Company, founded in 1881 by John D. Spreckels & Brothers.

Then at #3 is the Hawaiian Hotel. A check of old newspapers shows the Hawaiian Hotel opened in Honolulu in late February 1872. Advertisements and news stories about the new hotel don’t indicate its address or location. Apparently Honolulu was small enough that everyone knew where it was. The hotel boasted gas lighting, along with hot and cold water baths were available for 50 cents each. Ice cream was served “in the Parlor” every evening from 6-9 p.m. Eventually I found a small article indicating it was located downtown along, appropriately, Hotel Street.

Anyway, here’s the telephone listing. You can click to view (and read) a larger version.

And here’s the caption that accompanied the list.

I visited the exhibit yesterday, which happened to be the day the Hawaii Supreme Court handed down its decision giving the proposed Thirty Meter Telescope the legal green light to proceed towards construction near the summit of Mauna Kea. Given Kalakaua’s interest in and support for modern science and technology, that somehow seemed appropriate.

Here’s the museum’s description of the Kalakaua exhibit.

Ho‘oulu: The King Kalakaua Era considers art and experimentation in the Hawaiian Kingdom during the reign of King David Kalakaua (1874–1891). Cosmopolitanism—the idea that local politics share systemic parallels internationally as part of a world citizenry—was a thriving philosophy in the Hawaiian Kingdom, and it was expressed through art.

People in Hawai‘i developed a visual language that merged art and politics, and that presented local iterations of global art styles. They expanded an existing visual culture using a combination of indigenous and introduced materials, concepts, and techniques. The show features experimental art works alongside academic art works to explore how both the avant-garde and the academic were deployed in the shaping of a national identity.

The exhibition prompts conversations about issues of adaptability, economy, ceremony, and, more important, gets at underlying perceptions about the Hawaiian place in the world at turn of the century. It also challenges ideas about tradition, modernity, and culture in Hawai‘i through the collection and loaned works.

It’s really worth seeing. Probably more than once.