Kaua'i police probe seems to yield little
By Jan TenBruggencate
Advertiser KauaÎi Bureau
LIHU'E, Kaua'i — The long-awaited Kaua'i Police Commission charges against Police Chief George Freitas have done little to clarify a puzzling situation.
Freitas is finishing up four months' paid leave pending investigation of complaints against him—complaints that include parking on the wrong side of the street and yelling at one of his assistant chiefs.
On the lone charge that has potential criminal content—interfering in a criminal investigation—county Prosecuting Attorney Michael Soong said he is aware of the allegation but that no criminal action is pending against the chief.
"Someone had the arrogance to put those (charges) in as if they were substantial," said the Rev. Jan Rudinoff, a Police Department chaplain and former chairman of the county Ethics Commission. "My sense is that someone had hurt feelings, was unhappy with him as a person and is looking for a way to get rid of him."
Freitas will be asked to answer to specific charges at a Police Commission meeting. That meeting is apparently scheduled for Dec. 11, although his lawyer, former state attorney general Margery Bronster, said it is not clear whether she can attend a meeting on that date, or whether the county has given Freitas sufficient notice of the hearing and the specifics of the charges against him.
"I'm really surprised and disgusted that the Police Commission has so completely ignored the chief's rights" throughout the investigation, she said.
A veteran observer of county government said he feels the Police Commission got caught up in the sheer number of allegations and let the case go further than it should have. "I think it's something that got out of control and they don't know how to proceed from this point on," said Ray Chuan, a retired physicist and community activist.
County Council Chairman Ron Kouchi worries that the county will be sued over how the case has portrayed the chief.
Bronster, in a 10-page letter to County Attorney Hartwell Blake, cited numerous legal errors in the handling of the investigation. "There is no escaping the conclusion that Chief Freitas is being denied his due process rights and has been injured as a result of the action of the Commission and you," Bronster wrote.
Although the Police Commission has discussed the case almost entirely in executive sessions, from which the public is excluded, some details of the process that led to the commission's charges have been gleaned from sources such as letters from Bronster, statements by Blake and discussions with Freitas.
The two officers who brought the charges against the chief to the Police Commission were Lt. Alvin Seto and Assistant Chief Melvin Morris, both in the department's Investigative Services Bureau.
Seto apparently launched an independent investigation of Freitas after running into trouble for discussing a co-worker's medical condition in a public meeting. Bronster said she was told that one of Seto's allegations was that the chief was "ambiguous, deceptive and rude" in a telephone call Seto made to ask about the consequences of his gaffe.
Freitas confronted Morris, who is Seto's superior, after learning that Seto was investigating the chief. Morris said Freitas was abusive and failed to follow a department policy that orders should be issued "in clear, understandable language, civil in tone and ... in furtherance of departmental business."
Freitas said Morris and Seto should have known that it is department policy to tell people being investigated that they are being investigated, and to tell them the charges against them.
On receiving Seto's and Morris' complaints, the commission voted to place Freitas on leave with pay for four months, and arranged for Honolulu Police Commission investigator John Ko to look into the charges. After more than two months of work, Ko recommended dismissing several charges but proceeding with seven.
The Police Commission on Friday rejected two of those counts: parking on the wrong side of the street and using a police car for personal business. But the panel voted to move forward with five other charges.
In the case portrayed as the most serious, the chief is accused of hindering the prosecution of a criminal case by ordering an investigator not to re-interview a witness. The charge also says a memo from prosecutors calling for the re-interview never got from the chief's office to detectives.
Freitas said the case involved investigators trying to develop one criminal case using information in another case in which the department had appropriately promised a complainant confidentiality. "It is my responsibility to protect that confidentiality," he said.
Prosecuting Attorney Soong said he did not feel the chief's action hurt the criminal case.
A second complaint said the chief transported a civilian, his girlfriend, in a police vehicle, violating department standards of conduct.
Freitas said he and other officers sometimes transport family members to police functions in unmarked cars. Although a technical violation, it is not one the department is strict about, he said. He noted that he and his primary accuser, Seto, both arrived at one police dinner with civilian guests in their department cars.
"It is not my practice to use the county car for purely personal purposes. Have I ever stopped (to shop) along the way (to a police function)? Probably," he said.
The three other charges against the chief involve the conversations he had with two senior officers—Seto and Morris.
Rudinoff said the entire investigation reflects negatively on Kaua'i County.
"The sad thing is that nobody's going to come out a winner," he said.
