Lindsey sisters' trial may be in Las Vegas
| • | State asks for review of Wong charges |
By David Waite
Advertiser Staff Writer
Former Bishop Estate trustee Lokelani Lindsey will have her day in court on federal bankruptcy fraud and money laundering charges, but it won't be in Hawai'i.
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The change of venue granted yesterday for Lindsey and her sister Marlene Lindsey is only the third of its kind granted by federal judges here during the past 20 years, her attorney William Harrison said.
Lokelani Lindsey was granted a change of venue for her trial.
Harrison, who is representing Lindsey along with attorney David Chesnoff, asked that the trial take place in Las Vegas. Chesnoff participated in yesterday's court hearing by telephone from his Las Vegas office.
During his argument in favor of a change of venue, Harrison, of Honolulu, said that Lokelani Lindsey's first name alone is all that is needed for Hawai'i residents to recognize his client — and to draw a largely negative response.
Although Harrison and Chesnoff asked that the trial take place in Las Vegas, Assistant U.S. Attorney Les Osborne Jr. said holding the trial in Los Angeles or San Franciso would spare the estimated 12 witness in the case, virtually all of them from Hawai'i, of additional travel between the West Coast and Las Vegas.
Officials of the federal court system's Ninth District, which includes Hawai'i, will determine where the trial will be held.
Ousted in 1999
Lokelani Lindsey and the four other Bishop Estate trustees were ousted in 1999 after state and federal investigations found evidence of mismanagement and abuse of their power.
U.S. District Judge Helen Gillmor agreed with Lindsey's attorneys that the overwhelming negative publicity Lindsey received during the past four years as a result of the Bishop Estate/Kamehameha Schools controversy would make it virtually impossible to ensure that Lindsey would receive a fair trial in Hawai'i.
In granting the request by Lokelani Lindsey to move the bankruptcy fraud case, which is unrelated to Bishop Estate, Gillmor said that during the years-long controversy over Bishop Estate, Lindsey was a "lightning rod" for negative publicity and "was portrayed as having abused her position there."
"It would be a very difficult thing to find a jury (in Hawai'i) that has not formed an opinion as to Lokelani Lindsey," Gillmor said.
Anyone who has lived in Hawai'i during the past five years "has been aware and known about the entire Kamehameha Schools/Bishop Estate controversy," Gillmor said.
During the past four years, Lindsey's name was mentioned 5,875 times in The Honolulu Advertiser and Honolulu Star-Bulletin, Harrison said. The number of news reporters in the courtroom and television cameras outside the courthouse was an indication of the continuing "media frenzy" over his client's affairs, Harrison said.
He said that even today, strangers come up to Lindsey on the street and berate her, accusing her of "stealing money from the Kamehameha Schools beneficiaries."
Conspiracy charges
Lindsey and her sister Marlene Lindsey were indicted by a federal grand jury in December on charges that allege the women conspired to hide assets from a trustee in Marlene Lindsey's bankruptcy case, and from creditors to whom Marlene Lindsey's business, Marlene's Hairstyling, owed money.
The bankruptcy was declared a "no-asset case," and creditors received no payments.
The indictment claims Marlene Lindsey held 100 shares of stock, worth $100,000 when she filed for bankruptcy Jan. 20, 1995, but failed to disclose the holding when she met with creditors a month later.
Marlene Lindsey transferred the stock to Lokelani Lindsey on Dec. 27, 1995, who then transferred it to a third person, hoping the stock sale would go unnoticed by the bankruptcy trustee, according to the indictment.
The money was then given to a fourth person, who set up an account for the purpose of paying Marlene Lindsey for the stock, and, on Feb. 13, 1996, Lokelani Lindsey withdrew $35,000 from the account in the form of a cashier's check, according to the indictment.
Government prosecutors argued that an impartial jury could be found here and cited past, high publicity cases such as that of con man Ronald Rewald, who was imprisoned in 1985 for bilking hundreds out of millions of dollars. He was released from a federal prison in 1995.
But Harrison argued that the Rewald case generated 295 newspaper articles during a two-year period and that the subject had not been before the public for about two years prior to the start of Rewald's trial.
Gillmor set a trial date of Nov. 6 for the Lindsey sisters.
Also yesterday, the Hawai'i Supreme Court dismissed Lindsey's appeal of her dismissal as a Bishop Estate trustee.
The Supreme Court justices said the issue was "moot" because after she was ordered removed from the board, she submitted a permanent resignation.
