Officials widen probe of airport kickbacks
By Jim Dooley
Advertiser Staff Writer
More charges of political and personal kickbacks surfaced yesterday in the widening criminal investigation of a bid-rigging conspiracy at Honolulu International Airport.
Painting contractor Herbert M. Hirota said he paid $5,000 to $7,000 in kickbacks to airport maintenance superintendent Dennis Hirokawa in return for receiving "small" airport maintenance and repair contracts worth no more than $25,000 each.
And another airport contractor, Roy T. Yoshida, said he refused to pay kickbacks but did perform "favors" for another airport official implicated in the fraud, Richard Okada, which included "helping to paint one of Okada's homes and canvassing the Manoa and Pacific Heights areas during the 2000 gubernatorial election campaign," according to a copy of Yoshida's plea deal with the state obtained by The Advertiser yesterday.
Hirota, 51, president of Hirota Painting Co., Inc., pleaded guilty to one count of first-degree theft yesterday and agreed to repay at least $25,000 to the state and to cooperate in a federal investigation of the airport case.
Yoshida, president of Yoshida Auto Paint Shop, Inc., in Waipahu, reached a similar agreement with the state last year. He has agreed to repay at least $6,500.
Like other contractors who have struck plea deals with the state, Hirota and Yoshida admitted they were part of an airport bid-rigging conspiracy in which dozens of smaller-cost repair and maintenance jobs were steered to their companies by state officials in return for kickbacks of cash, political donations and other favors.
Hirota said in his plea bargain that Hirokawa asked for cash "donations" and "gave me the impression that the donations were for political campaigns."
No record of donations by Hirota, his company, or Dennis Hirokawa to any Isle political campaign were found yesterday in a limited search of State Campaign Spending Commission files.
Yoshida said he was pressed by Okada, head of the visitor information program for the state airports division, to "double the amount" of his billings to the state and "then give kickbacks in the form of political contributions to Okada."
Yoshida said he never paid kickbacks but did favors for Okada, including the political canvassing in the 2000 gubernatorial election.
The plea agreement does not say what gubernatorial candidate or political party Yoshida was canvassing for in 2000 and no record of such work could be found yesterday in a survey of Campaign Spending Commission files. Yoshida and his attorney, Stanford Nakamoto, could not be reached for comment on the matter.
Spending commission director Robert Watada said if Yoshida was coerced or otherwise required to work for a political campaign, "then under the law that should have been reported as an in-kind donation to the campaign because it was not voluntary."
Yoshida said in the plea agreement that he was brought into the airport scheme by Okada's cousin, contractor Michael Furukawa. Furukawa and his wife, Frances, were arrested by state investigators in 2002 and more than $1 million in their assets was seized. Neither has been charged in the case but both are named as major conspirators in the scheme in a $1.25 million civil fraud lawsuit filed by the state last month.
Campaign Spending Commission records reviewed by The Advertiser yesterday show that Michael and Frances Furukawa gave $125 in December 1999 to the political campaign of state Sen. Cal Kawamoto, D-18th (Waipahu, Crestview, Pearl City), chairman of the Senate Transportation Committee.
A company controlled by the Furukawas and linked to the bid-rigging in the civil fraud suit, B & U, Inc., gave $250 contributions to the Kawamoto campaign in 1999 and 2001. Civil and criminal court records filed by state investigators say the bid-rigging conspiracy occurred from at least 1997 to mid-2001.
Kawamoto told The Advertiser last week that he is a longtime acquaintance of Richard Okada and members of Okada's family, has lunch with Okada occasionally, but has never received campaign donations from Okada.
Arthur K. Inada, another airport contractor charged in the case, said in a plea deal signed with the state last year that he paid $129,000 in kickbacks to Okada and Hirokawa, including $40,000 in cash to Okada for "political contributions."
Inada described Okada as the state Transportation Department's legislative lobbyist and airport personnel said that Okada played an influential unofficial role in various airport activities outside his official scope of work, including contract awards and personnel hirings and transfers.
Kawamoto said he was never lobbied by Richard Okada despite their longtime personal acquaintance and occasional meals together.
Kawamoto's wife, Carolyn, is a clerk in the airport procurement office, which processed some $9 million worth of "small" airport repair contracts now covered by the investigation. Kawamoto said his wife has worked at the airport for about 10 years but that Okada had no role in her landing the job there.
Okada and Hirokawa resigned their airport jobs in 2002 after they were arrested by state investigators. Attorneys for both men have said their clients have broken no laws.
Deputy Attorney General Lawrence Goya said his office is negotiating a final plea agreement with one contractor. Once that is finalized, the case will be turned over to the U.S. Attorney and the FBI, Goya said.
Reach Jim Dooley at jdooley@honoluluadvertiser.com or 535-2447.
