Peter Boy details may be released
By Derrick DePledge
Advertiser Capitol Bureau
The director of the state Department of Human Services yesterday said she will try to release some information it has been keeping confidential on Peter Boy Kema, whose 1997 disappearance generated statewide attention to missing children.
State lawmakers have sought information on Peter Boy kept by Child Protective Services, which is part of the department, in the hopes that it might reveal more about the events that led to his disappearance. Lawmakers also want to learn more details about the case from Big Island police and prosecutors.
Peter Boy
Years before he vanished, Peter Boy was in foster care because of child abuse concerns but he was eventually returned to his parents. A teenage cousin said Peter Boy was being abused in the months before he disappeared. The Puna boy was 6 years old at the time.
Peter Boy's father has said that he gave the child to a family friend during a trip to O'ahu but the friend, like the boy, has never been found. Police have classified the case as a murder investigation. His parents have denied any wrongdoing.
"I don't think there is any closure," said state Rep. Dennis Arakaki, D-30th (Moanalua, Kalihi Valley, 'Alewa), the chairman of the state House Health Committee, who has asked for the information for several years.
The health committee and the state House Human Services Committee will hold a hearing today on resolutions requesting the information.
Lawmakers want to see the records to help determine whether the state should have done more to monitor the boy's care. "I think there has to be some responsibility on the part of the state," Arakaki said. "They may be afraid of admitting that maybe mistakes have been made."
Child Protective Services has said in the past that the records are confidential. But Lillian Koller, director of the Department of Human Services, said a new administrative rule approved in December allows for the release of some of the material. The rule sets conditions for when the department can release child welfare information.
Koller cautioned that she could not release any records on Peter Boy covered by a 1999 state Supreme Court ruling. The court held that Peter Boy's Family Court records should not be made public because it would violate the privacy of his siblings. "It would just have to be information that we have in our possession that's not prohibited by that court order," Koller said.
The Advertiser went to court to try to obtain the Family Court records. A Big Island Family Court judge agreed to release the records but the decision was reversed by the Supreme Court.
Reach Derrick DePledge at ddepledge@honoluluadvertiser.com or 525-8084.
