Posted on: Tuesday, February 26, 2002

EDITORIAL
State prosecutor lacks 'fundamental fairness'

The recent state Supreme Court decision yet again dismissing criminal theft charges against former Bishop Estate trustees Henry Peters and Richard Wong for reasons of prosecutorial misconduct should be the last straw.

Not only should the single-minded pursuit of these charges by the state finally end, but Gov. Ben Cayetano should take a close look at just why it is his attorney general's office has had so much difficulty in recognizing a serious judicial wake-up call.

Criminal theft charges against Peters and Wong were the direct outgrowth of the attorney general's effort to have them removed as trustees.

Long after Wong and Peters resigned from the estate board, the state continued to pursue charges stemming from a Hawai'i Kai land deal — even after a judge repeatedly threw the charges out on grounds of prosecutorial abuse of the grand jury process.

In the latest — and, we think, most grave — such instance, the state Supreme Court, in a blistering attack on the attorney general's office, has ordered the state to stop pursuing these charges, saying state prosecutors "threatened the integrity of the judicial process" while acting in "complete disregard of the attorney-client privilege and the rules of evidence."

This newspaper has protested the state's dogged prosecution of these charges for several years now on the simple basis of fairness and expediency. Peters and Wong and their fellow trustees are long gone — thank goodness — from the Bishop Estate board, which as a result has changed its name, its style and its reputation entirely for the better. The state's work vis a vis the old trustees, we've argued, is done. It's unseemly and unfair to keep trying to settle these old scores.

But now the issue isn't only fairness to Wong and Peters — which the latest ruling makes clear has been denied them — but the "serious threat to the integrity of the judicial process" caused by the attorney general's office in this case.

The high court ruling argues eloquently that the attorney general's duty isn't just to win convictions, but to ensure "that justice shall be done." The state's repeated failure to uphold this standard in this case is a blemish on this state's reputation.