Posted on: Tuesday, August 3, 2004
Legislator calls campaign complaint perjury
By Gordon Y.K. Pang
Advertiser Capitol Bureau
An attorney for Rep. Eric Hamakawa says the Republican Party of Hawai'i may have committed perjury when it filed an ethics complaint against him in connection with an event he did not attend.
GOP chairman Brennon Morioka, in response, has agreed to drop the ethics complaint against Hamakawa, D-3rd (Hilo, Kea'au, Mt. View).
The complaint was one of 13 filed individually by Morioka on July 21 against Democratic incumbents, charging that they and about a dozen new House candidates violated ethics laws the previous day when they assembled in the state Capitol courtyard to announce their intent to run for office. The Democrats have denied any wrongdoing.
Hamakawa, who is not seeking re-election, was not present at the press conference. Todd Eddins, Hamakawa's attorney, said his client was home in Hilo at the time.
Eddins cited a statute that says false charges filed with the commission constitute the crime of perjury. It defines a false charge as occurring when the filer knows the charge to be false. Perjury can be a class C felony, which carries a maximum penalty of five years in prison.
Counter-claims against Morioka and the GOP were filed with both the Ethics Commission and the prosecutor's office. Dan Mollway, executive director of the commission, said perjury allegations are handled by the prosecutor's office. Jim Fulton, a spokesman for prosecutor Peter Carlisle, said the matter had been forwarded to the police department. Police spokeswoman Michelle Yu said the matter was in the hands of the Criminal Investigations Division.
"In our view, the Republican Party chairman committed a crime, and at a minimum, demonstrated a cavalier approach to slinging serious allegations against his political opponents," Eddins said yesterday. Morioka must have known that Hamakawa was not running for re-election and should have realized he did not attend the press conference, Eddins said.
Morioka denied knowing that Hamakawa was not present. The complaints against the incumbents were based on photos and news footage of the event, he said. "As far as I could tell, based on some of the photos that I looked at, I thought that one of the people there was Rep. Hamakawa," he said.
At a news conference at GOP headquarters detailing the complaints shortly before he filed them with the commission, Morioka was told by reporters that Hamakawa was not at the Capitol the previous day.
After talking to the media, Morioka said, he double-checked the photos he saw on the Internet and determined that Hamakawa did attend. "I went back to look at some of the photos and, to me, it still looked like it was him," he said. He added that he has never been introduced to Hamakawa, and is familiar with his appearance only from having seen him at a distance and in photographs.
Based on what Eddins has told the commission, Morioka said he has agreed to a request from Ethics Commission staff to drop the complaint against Hamakawa. "I take his word for it" that he wasn't there, he said.
Eddins said that regardless of Morioka's decision to drop his complaint, he does not expect Hamakawa will withdraw his.
Meanwhile, Morioka said he has filed an additional complaint against House Majority Leader Scott Saiki, D-22nd (McCully, Pawa'a), after having omitted him initially, saying he also was present.
Morioka's complaints charge that the Democrats should have obtained a special permit from the state before holding an assembly in the Capitol courtyard. He also cited a statute that bars state employees from electioneering on state property.
The Republicans, in June, held a press conference to announce a partial slate of candidates in the lobby of the State Office Tower, an event which included both incumbents and newcomers.
Reach Gordon Y.K. Pang at gpang@honoluluadvertiser.com at 525-8070.
