The Hawaii County Police Commission on Friday discussed correspondence from county Auditor Tyler Benner, then filed it into the record without a vote or any other action taken on allegations contained in the document.
The letter, dated April 26, said the auditor’s office had received a call on a “waste, fraud and abuse (whistleblower)” hotline alleging Hawaii Police Department was charging drivers found to be in possession of drug paraphernalia during traffic stops or DUI checkpoints with DUI.
The auditor’s correspondence referred to the alleged action as “a questionable field practice” and added “we perceive the allegation, if substantiated, as concerning.”
“Now, I want to be very clear we are not asserting the claim is true and correct,” Benner told the commission. “Because this inquiry was not in the scope of our hotline, we did not conduct an investigation, and we did not independently substantiate the claim. We simply referred it to the commission as the oversight body for (the police). I would have preferred to have taken it to the department directly and to work with them on this. But the position of the commission rules and charter … appeared to make it more appropriate to send the information to the commission and avoid obstacles that might impede their work.”
Commission Chairman Rick Robinson asked Benner if, as an auditor, he relies on people to substantiate their allegations when they come to him asking for something to be investigated.
“When we’re the ones conducting the investigation, we would substantiate it,” Benner replied. “But in this case, we were in receipt of information that doesn’t fit under the hotline’s definition, so it’s just a referral. … At that point, it’s not our kuleana to substantiate a claim.”
Police Chief Ben Moszkowicz told the commission the allegation by the hotline caller referred to in Benner’s letter “seems completely unsubstantiated.”
The chief added that he was more concerned about not being notified about the correspondence prior to seeing the agenda for Friday’s commission meeting.
“The first time I learned about this complaint about people who have drug paraphernalia are being charged with DUI … was last week, Thursday or Friday, whenever the meeting (agenda) was sent out …,” Moszkowicz told commissioners. “I noticed there was a correspondence.”
The chief said he got a copy of the letter from the commission’s secretary and, after reading it, called Capt. Tuckloy Aurello, commander of the Office of Professional Standards — the department’s internal affairs unit — and “immediately started an inquiry.”
“My problem is not with the content of the complaint, or the fact that it was referred (to the commission), but the timeliness with which it was referred to us. And this actually played out, in real life …,” he continued. “So, if you saw the Hawaii Tribune-Herald (on June 20), you saw the headline, above the fold … is ‘HPD’s DUI arrests questioned.’
“… We were fortunate, in this case, that when (the Tribune-Herald) called me for comment on the story, that I had seen it. … My issue is not with that, but what would have been the response if (the Tribune-Herald) or any other member of the media had called and said, ‘Well, Chief, what do you know about this? What’s your response to these allegations?’ — and I didn’t know. I only happened to find out because I looked the agenda. But the date on this communication is April 26.”
Moszkowicz said his “hope or expectation in terms of process improvement” is that Benner would also be “free to communicate” to him complaints “that don’t involve me, personally,” when he informs the commission.
“I can’t do much about what I don’t know,” Moszkowicz said. “And if the system is such that I can’t know until we have a hearing and the public knows, that’s fine, but it impacts the timeliness of when I can get to the bottom of whatever is happening.”
Email John Burnett at jburnett@hawaiitribune-herald.com.
