Senate panel endorses Public Safety nominee

By Lynda Arakawa
Advertiser Capitol Bureau

The Senate Judiciary and Hawaiian Affairs Committee yesterday unanimously endorsed the nomination of John F. Peyton Jr. as director of the state Department of Public Safety.

John F. Peyton Jr., Gov. Linda Lingle's choice to head the Department of Public Safety, is expected to be confirmed by the full Senate. Bruce Asato • The Honolulu Advertiser

As public safety director, Peyton will oversee the state's prisons as well as the state law enforcement division.

Peyton, an assistant U.S. attorney in Hawai'i for 20 years, is vice president of the High Judicial and Prosecutorial Councils of Bosnia and Herzogovina. The councils are responsible for reforming the judicial and prosecutorial services of the country.

Peyton's career with the U.S. attorney's office has included overseeing the Drug and Organized Crime Section, directing the Hawai'i High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area, and heading the law enforcement committee of the federal Weed and Seed program.

In his new job he will face a number of challenges that have lingered for years, including a crowded prison system and a demand for more drug abuse treatment programs for offenders. On Friday, three inmates escaped from the high-security Halawa Correctional Facility and are still at large.

Peyton, who will assume his new duties June 30 if confirmed, said he was planning to meet with acting public safety director James Propotnick later yesterday to discuss the escapes.

"Obviously we had a failure here, a failure in the system," Peyton said. "The question is: Is the failure structural? Is it procedural? Does it relate to personnel?

"We'll have to find out the answers to these things. We'll have to solve whatever the problem is that resulted in this escape, and then we have to address how to avoid anything like this in the future."

Peyton also said drug treatment is a "major priority for us in the overcrowding of our prisons" and he would support programs that successfully identify nonviolent, first-time offenders who would be diverted to drug treatment rather than incarceration.

"We have to make sure we only have people in there who need to be there," he said.

Overall, Peyton told the committee he plans to "truly professionalize" the department.

"What I would like to do is create a department in which the public has complete confidence that decisions are made based on the merits and political considerations are never part of the decision-making," he said. "I hope to bring this attitude to the department in case there's any doubt that that is how we do business."

Reach Lynda Arakawa at larakawa@honoluluadvertiser.com or at 525-8070.