Senate-House Investigative Committee to Review Use of Ethics Commission Report
Impartiality of investigator’s report on the Bureau of Conveyances has been questioned
HONOLULU – The Joint Senate-House Investigative Committee looking into the Bureau of Conveyances will review its subpoena of a reportprepared by an investigator working for the Hawai‘i State Ethics Commission, in light of claims that the report may be biased.
“It is vital that the work of the investigative committee be beyond reproach,” said Senator Jill Tokuda, the Senate’s co-chair on the committee. “It is incumbent upon us to provide the public with an investigation and a report in which they can have complete confidence. Given the concerns we have heard, the committee needs to take the time and make the effort necessary to ensure that we are proceeding in a fair manner.”
On its first day of hearings on June 20, the committee issued a subpoena to the Ethics Commission to produce documents and reports relating to the Commission’s earlier investigation of possible ethical violations at the Bureau of Conveyances. In a letter delivered to members of the committee yesterday, Ethics Commission executive director Daniel J. Mollway stated that he “cannot comply with the request for documents stated in the subpoena” because he had received reports that questioned the impartiality of the Commission’s investigator, Hilton Lui. “The procedures of the Hawai‘i State Ethics Commission and due process require that our enforcement work be absolutely impartial,” said Mollway’s letter. The Joint Investigative Committee has also hired Lui as its investigator.
“I have spoken to Speaker Emeritus Joe Souki,” said Tokuda, referring to the committee’s House co-chair, “and we both want to make it clear that at this point, we are not rendering an opinion as to the quality of Hilton Lui’s work for the Ethics Commission or the conclusions he reached in that investigation. Mr. Lui is currently out of the state, but we will review these matters with him upon his return, and make further decisions at that time about the appropriate course to take.” Souki is currently conducting legislative business in his House district on Maui.
Created pursuant to Senate Concurrent Resolution No. 226, the Joint Senate-House Investigative Committee is investigating the security of documents recorded with the Bureau of Conveyances, private computer access to and tampering with those documents, and the operations and management of the Bureau.