Hey, Maui folks. Does anyone know the story here?
There’s an old abandoned building out in a former cane field between Kahului and Kihei, not too far away from the Maui Humane Society.
It’s simply names of people who apparently went missing on Maui and the year of each disappearance. It includes a phone number to contact MPD with any information.
Does it imply there might be connections between these disappearances? Who painted the names out there? What’s the story?
James Lowery, deputy chief of the Arlington (Texas) Police Department and one of the seven finalists being considered for the position of Honolulu’s police chief, was recently criticized by a police union leader for improperly ordering the destruction of a document related to a police brutality case. But the criticism is part of the union’s reaction to a scandal over faked traffic stops that led to 16 officers losing their jobs.
According to published accounts, the incident involving the document began with a videotaped confrontation in July 2017 between an Arlington police officer and two teenage boys, ages 14 and 16.
The video, taken by the boy’s mother in July 2017, shows the officer arresting the younger teen, and then throwing the other boy to the ground head first. The video went viral. By the end of August it reportedly had been seen over 200,000 times.
The arresting officer, Chad Haning, prepared and submitted a “Use of Force” report, as required by the department’s rules.
According to an article in the Arlington Voice:
As that document moved up the chain of command, Deputy Chief James Lowery allegedly ordered Lieutenant Michael Moses – Haning’s superior commander — to “get rid of it.” Moses complied by shredding the document.
According to Haning’s lawyer, Randall Moore, the destruction of that document amounts to a felony offense under Texas Penal Code section 37.10, which states a person commits an offense if he or she “intentionally destroys, conceals, removes, or otherwise impairs the verity, legibility, or availability of a governmental record.”
Moore, the attorney, was joined by the president of the Arlington Municipal Patrolman’s Association in criticizing Lowery’s actions, saying it should be pursued as a possible felony.
But the allegations against Lowery appear to be part of an ongoing conflict over disciplinary actions by the department against officers accused of reporting phony traffic stops to inflate their numbers. The union had complained that officers were responding to the department’s use of an informal quota system when assigning overtime. Such quota systems are prohibited by state law.
Five officers were eventually indicted and resigned, along with 11 others, to avoid prosecution, according to published reports.
The union has criticized the department for not pursuing alleged violations by top ranking officers in the same way that patrol officers were investigated and disciplined.
The public criticism of Lowery appears to be part of the union’s broader defense of those officers fired or forced to resign as a result of the fake traffic stops.
A department spokesman was quoted as saying that an internal affairs investigation of the original confrontation with the two teens would be examining all aspects of the case, including destruction of the use of force report.
A comment left on an earlier blog post raises substantive and very significant questions about HPD’s Criminal Intelligence Unit. Misuse of the unit and its personnel are a big part of the indictments that have come down so far.
I’ll quote the comment here in full.
Another area of concern that needs to be addressed beyond the Kealoha’s current case is the alleged improper and illegal conduct of the Criminal Intelligence Unit.
It has to be cleaned out folks. The job of a CIU is to gather intelligence on criminal activity and terrorism. Frankly it is chilling to read in the indictment that CIU made a search of Mr. Puana’s home and conducted physical surveillance of him from “time to time” from June 2011 through 2013. How much time?
The obvious question that has not been completely answered is, if what they were doing here just one example of many where they were misused for “off the record” investigation of people who are not liked or marked for a “set up” by political or power interests? There has been recent criticism of cases filed by the Prosecutor outside of the normal channels through HPD and at least one has been criticized by a state court judge. Did Ms. Kealoha use the CIU or did she or others make it available for misuse by the Honolulu Prosecutor? Fair question, and it seems that abuses may have been committed at some level at that office to cover or protect Ms. Kealoha. You would expect that there must have been someone in the unit who was fed up with what was going on.
There should be another grand jury to look into these legitimate issues. It is premature to say this is over yet.
The indictment provides this description of the CIU:
A separate, federally-authorized and specialized unit of HPD called the Criminal Intelligence Unit (“CIU”) was responsible for gathering intelligence and data on organized crime, terrorism, and gang threats facing the City and County ofHonolulu. The members of CIU did not collect evidence to be used in the investigation and prosecution of criminal cases, but instead, passed intelligence information about criminal threats to other units in HPD and federal law enforcement partners.
It’s my understanding that some other major white collar crime investigations also would have been assigned to the CIU.
Then-Chief Kealoha apparently put his own people into CIU, including those named in last week’s indictment. These included the then-husband of Katherine Kealoha’s niece, Bobby Nguyen; a former boyfriend of Katherine Kealoha, Dan Sellers; and Derek Hahn, who formed Discount Energy Solutions LLC with Katherine Kealoha and Bronson M. Tokioka.
One wonders Chief Kealoha padded the unit with other of his favorites, and what officers were reassigned to make room for the chief’s picks for CIU.
And, as the comment above asks, can we believe the stolen mailbox was the only time these assets were deployed in illegitimate ventures?
It seems to me that the serious charges filed last week against Honolulu’s former police chief, his wife, and several officers in the chief’s inner circle, are also an indictment of the officials who sat on their hands as allegations surfaced over the past couple of years. From the mayor to the city council to the city prosecutor and the majority of the police commission, all looked the other way or hid behind the ongoing federal investigation to avoid having to deal with the situation.
Civil Beat is now reporting that the federal investigation is actively ongoing (see “How Far Will The Honolulu Police Corruption Investigation Spread?“).
A new federal grand jury has already been empaneled. Special prosecutor Wheat is scheduled to return to Hawaii in early November to continue his investigation into corruption and abuse of power within the Honolulu Police Department and other law enforcement agencies, potentially including the office of Honolulu Prosecuting Attorney Keith Kaneshiro.
Will all the city agencies continue to look the other way as the investigation spreads? It’s time to start thinking through what proactive steps would be appropriate at each level of authority.
At the same time, we really need to recognize Alexander Silvert, the federal defender who not only did his job in defending Katherine Kealoha’s uncle against charges that he stole the chief’s mailbox, but gathered and later shared enough evidence to kick start the federal criminal probe into corruption in HPD. Silvert has been seen a lot on the news, but hasn’t really gotten the public credit he deserves for sticking his neck out and pressing for the case to go forward.
And what about Michael Wheat, the assistant U.S. Attorney from Los Angeles who has been directing the Grand Jury investigation. Wheat is reportedly on a “short list” of candidates for the vacant post of U.S. Attorney in San Diego (“Who has the inside track on being the next U.S. attorney in San Diego?“). Hopefully we’ll see someone publish a more complete profile of Wheat now that this case has crossed a key threshold.