House Standing Committee on Judiciary & Hawaiian Affairs

Welcome, everyone, to the House Committee on Judiciary and Hawaiian Affairs. Thank you very much for making time to come and join us today and provide your testimony. It really helps us do our job better. My name is David Tarnas. I'm the Chair of the Committee, and I'm grateful to have my Vice Chair, Representative Poepoe, here.

Thank you very much. And we have our Members, Representative Shimizu and Representative Cochran, and the others are listening from their office, and they'll be here presently. It is Wednesday, February 25th, 2:00pm here in Conference Room 325.

And if you're testifying today, we have a lot of testifiers, so I would request that you keep your testimony to two minutes. I'll ask you to summarize at that point.

And if you're new and you haven't been in this room in a little while, we've changed our microphone and sound system set up, so microphones are now in the ceiling. And so you just need to stand at the podium and speak clearly, articulate. And the microphone should pick up your sound.

They also pick up the sound for any side conversations you have. So if you're whispering to your neighbor, they might hear you on YouTube, so keep that in mind. And phones, they'll hear that, too. So if you could silence your phones and all that, that'd be great.

If you're on Zoom and you're testifying, please keep yourself muted and your video off until you testify, and then turn it on to testify, and then turn it off when you're complete.

And if you have issues, technical issues, just use your Zoom Chat function to communicate with our great technical staff, and they'll see what they can do to help you out. If you're disconnected, don't panic. Rejoin as soon as you can, and I'll try to fit you in to finish your testimony.

If the power goes out in the building here and we have to stop our hearing, we'll reschedule and we'll post appropriate notice so you'll know when we're meeting and what we're talking about. If you're testifying on Zoom, please avoid using any trademarked or copyrighted images. That kicks us off of YouTube. So that's a problem.

And then please just testify with aloha, no profanity or uncivil behavior. It's okay to disagree, but let's not be disagreeable. We got a lot of good things that we can do together, even if we disagree.

Yes.

Yeah. And if you have already notified through your testimony submission that you want to testify, orally that's great. If you just decided that you want to provide oral testimony, if you could sign up over here at the table. The gentleman is signing up right now. Just go ahead and sign up over there.

Then you can give us your name, what bill you want to testify on, and then we'll be prepared to be able to welcome you to testify during that bill. And with that, let's go ahead and get started with our first bill. House Bill 1886 House Draft 1, relating to government operations.

This bill establishes provisions limiting state and federal collaboration for purposes of immigration enforcement operations. It establishes identification and facial coverings standards for state and federal law enforcement officers. Establishes criminal offenses for improper facial coverings and lack of visible identification and unauthorized civil immigration interrogation, arrest, or detention. First up, we have the Office of Hawaiian affairs on zoom. Go ahead.

Aloha Chair, Vice chair, Members of the Committee, McKenna Woodward, on behalf of the Office of Hawaiian Affairs in support of this measure, Mahalo nui to you and your staff for allowing me to testify virtually today. I'm down with a fever and didn't want to get anyone sick.

But for this bill for many Native Hawaiian communities, histories of surveillance over policing and unequal enforcement have contributed to longstanding mistrust of government systems. Hawaii's history, including the overthrow and a long legacy of militarization means armed enforcement in civilian spaces can have an outsized impact on community trust, particularly among Kanaka Maoli.

When enforcement occurs without clear identification, transparency or constitutional guard rails, mistrust deepens and community safety wavers. Requiring visible identification during public facing law enforcement activity increases accountability while preserving officer safety through narrow exemptions for tactical undercover and hazardous operations. Public safety is stronger when communities know who is exercising authority and trust that constitutional protections will be upheld.

So for these reasons, we urge you respectfully to pass this bill. And mahalo nui for the opportunity to testify.

Certainly. Thank you very much for testifying. Next we have the Office of the Public Defender, Ms. Haley Cheng. Welcome.

Good morning. Excuse me. Good afternoon. Chair, Vice Chair, Members of the Committee, Hayley Cheng, first Deputy of the Office of the Public Defender. Thank you for the opportunity to testify this afternoon.

We have submitted testimony in support of this measure and we are going to echo, I believe, a lot of what the Committee is going to hear this afternoon regarding why transparency in law enforcement is important and why there needs to be clear boundaries between the federal and state agencies.

I wanted to just focus the limited time that I have in front of you this afternoon on the situation that's unique to the Office of the Public Defender.

We, of course, are very, very worried and support this measure for all of the reasons that we've listed, but mainly and in large part due to the wanting to keep certain spaces secret, such as the courthouses.

What we have seen statewide and through has been reported by our statewide offices is that this has definitely increased fear of attending court, whether you're a witness, a family member, a defendant, and that's for your own proceedings, or if you're checking with probation or there to support a family member, even if you are a witness or a possible victim or complainant.

So that is something that OPD is very or the Office of the Public Defender is extremely worried about. We also believe that transparency in law enforcement, as we also represent people who encounter law enforcement frequently, the requirement for transparency will only make things safer.

And we believe that the exceptions in the bill adequately address any concerns that law enforcement may have. So thank you for the opportunity. I'll be available for questions.

Thank you very much. Just for those who have come in recently, we have a new microphone system. It picks up all sounds in the room, any side conversations or anything.

So I would request you to try to keep everything to a minimum so that we don't get in the way of the audio feed so that everyone in the public can hear what we're saying here. That's important. Okay, next. Veronica Mendoza on zoom, not present. Liza Ryan-Gill, welcome.

Aloha Chair, Vice chair, Members of the Committee, the Hawai' I Coalition for Immigrant Rights represents about 30 organizations across the Paa' ina that work with immigrants or immigrant led. And this is one of our priority bills within our campaign for Immigrant justice.

It's one element of something that we want to see forward, which is to make sure that all of our allies and folks that also feel compelled to be on the streets and exercise their First Amendment rights to protest that we are giving them adequate protection.

Just for example, a couple of weeks ago we got noticed that we had a surge of federal agents that were coming onto Oahu that we have not recognized as previously working more than 40, which is a significant increase.

And one of the first things we did was reach out to our chiefs of police to let them know that this might be happening and that if there was a large action that there would likely be a community response.

And we want to work collaboratively with our local police department to make sure that everybody's rights are defended and adequately supported as we exercise First Amendment rights. So we stand in support and just want to continue to have that kind of strong working relationship with our local police.

Thank you very much. Mandy Fernandes, ACLU of Hawaii.

Good afternoon. Chair Tarnas Vice Chair Committee Members. Mandy Fernandes, I'm the policy Director with the American Civil Liberties Union of Hawaii. We're a nonpartisan nonprofit organization that seeks to defend the rights guaranteed to us by the state and federal constitutions.

In Hawaii, we understand that safety is rooted in aloha and in our responsibility to care for one another. That's our Kuleana. When our families are torn apart, when people are afraid to go to work, take their kids to school or seek care at a hospital, that's not safety, that's fear.

Across the country, we are seeing masked federal agents operating without visible identification, using unmarked vehicles, and refusing to provide basic transparency. Those tactics erode trust and undermine the constitutional principles we are sworn to uphold. In our island communities, where relationships matter and accountability is personal, secretive policing has no place.

When people are afraid of law enforcement, they're far less likely to report crime, cooperate as witnesses, or seek help when they need it. Anyone that works in law enforcement or who delivers direct services will tell you that trust can be hard to win and easy to lose.

When our communities cannot trust law enforcement, we are all less safe. Real public safety comes from stable housing, access to food and healthcare, strong schools, mental health services. It comes from trust between communities and those who serve them. This measure is not anti law enforcement, it is pro accountability.

It ensures the local resources are not diverted to federal operations that separate families and destabilize communities. It makes clear that our state and county agencies cannot be co opted into actions that undermine civil liberties and community trust. Hawaii has always charted its own course, guided by fairness, dignity, and respect.

By strengthening transparency, limiting cooperation and participation in harmful federal task forces, and establishing clear protections for safe community spaces, we affirm our commitment to creating communities where people can live openly, seek help when they need it, and trust their government. Thank you so much for your leadership on this and we urge you to support this important measure.

Thank you very much, Ms. Fernandes. Next, Michael Golojuch, Pride at Work.

Good afternoon. Michael Golojuch Jr. He/him pronouns. President of Prior Work Hawaii. We stand in strong support of this bill. Local resources should not be used, local law enforcement resources should not be used for the vendetta that we see from the Federal Government against our immigrant communities.

Having masked slave catchers playing ICE agents out there does not make our streets safer. We are seeing on the continent these unmarked vehicles, unidentified quote unquote officers who have no training, no skills, couldn't pass a basic physical test, going around terrorizing our neighbors.

The fact that we are any any dollars that be we that would be moved away from protecting our citizens to enforcing these on unconstitutional pickups, kidnappings that we're seeing in is not acceptable in any case any way shape or form. We need our cops on the streets protecting us as we see gun violence rising in our streets.

This is not immigrants doing that. This is unfortunately our own people doing that and we need the cops doing working their patrols. We already hear, we hear time and time again in the news how HPD is understaffed, they're missing police officers.

They should not be taken out of their normal patrol records to go out and scoop up citizens. Immigration is not a criminal act. It is a civil case and that we need our cops doing their jobs protecting us from criminals, not a civil thing.

So I encourage you to pass this law protect us from this despicable actions that we're seeing from the unmasked, untrained, unregulated slave capture. So please pass this bill. Mahalo,

Thank you. Next, the Legal Clinic, Tina Sablan.

Hello, Chair, Vice Chair and Members, Tina Sablan, Community and Policy Advocate for the Legal Clinic. We are a nonprofit that advances immigrant justice statewide through legal services, advocacy, and education. We submitted written testimony in strong support of this measure as well as the other immigrant justice bills on today agenda.

We recognize that there are presently some overlapping provisions, particularly between House Bill 1886 HD1 and House Bill 2540 HD1, as well as with other measures pending before the Legislature that also restrict secret policing tactics and limit local collaboration with federal immigration enforcement.

We appreciate and support the Legislature's efforts to harmonize these measures to strengthen transparency and accountability for law enforcement, reinforce safeguards and constitutional rights and provide clear guidance for state and county agencies.

And just briefly, on this bill, the particular provisions that we hope to see preserved as legislation moves forward and that are not covered in House Bill 2540 HD1 include enforceable standards for visible identification and restrictions on facial coverings by law enforcement, with penalties for violations and narrow but reasonable exceptions for officer safety.

We also support the criminal penalties this bill provides for unauthorized civil immigration and interrogation, arrest, or detention and the clarification that reasonable suspicion may not be based on race, ethnicity, language, or other protected characteristics. Mahalo for your consideration.

Thank you very much. Tim Huycke.

Aloha. As a retired police officer after 34 years of service, I find it appalling that a police officer would hide their identity and or refuse to identify themselves. A professional police officer knows they are accountable to the public for their actions.

A police officer is aware that the job that they do is dangerous, yet shows the courage to perform their duties. Any police officer who is afraid of someone being able to identify who they are while they're engaged in their duties should not be a police officer.

No police officer should wear a mask covering your face except for an extreme medical or cold weather situation. Every police officer performing law enforcement in public should be uniformed, and that uniform should include the name of their agency, and their own name, or at least their department's individual identification number.

Every police officer engaged in law enforcement duties in public should be in a marked vehicle if they use a vehicle. If a police officer is asked who they are, that officer should as soon as possible clearly identify themselves. If a police officer does their job properly, they should be proud, not hide in fear.

These standards should apply to everyone, including federal law enforcement that is enforcing the law in the state of Hawaii. Also like to add the fact that the court case Terry versus Ohio identifies when a detention can be made versus an arrest.

Court case US versus Sharp clarifies that a detention can be no longer than 20 minutes in general. And also one last thing I want to add is the fact that immigration is a federal issue, not a state certified such as HPD issue.

They have no jurisdiction and they're already busy taking care of the crimes that they have to deal with. Mahalo.

Thank you very much. Next. Francis Nakamoto.

Chair Tarnas, Vice Chair Poepoe, Representative Shimizu, my rep., thank you for this opportunity. I did submit lengthy testimony, so I'm going to try to keep it real short and sweet.

Thank you for summarizing.

In the long history of our law enforcement in the United States, law enforcement officers never wore masks.

From the early sheriffs and constables, they never wore masks. Highway patrol officers, military police never wore masks. FBI agents and local and state police officers never wore masks. The only people that were allowed to wear masks in our government were executioners.

People, the agents who shot Renee Good and Alex Pretti were in fact executioners and two of them almost got away with it because they weren't wearing masks and they weren't identified. We can't allow that to happen in a state of Hawaii

Must enforce a ban on masks and identification of all ICE and agents because not only does that ensure or assist in accountability, but it also may discourage someone from acting criminally against our people. Thank you.

Thank you very much. Next, Christine Andrews on Zoom. Please proceed.

Hi. Yes, thank you. I don't know if you can see me. My name is Christine Andrews and I am an attorney on Maui. I also serve as a volunteer constitutional observer here.

So I wanted to speak up for the people who engage in constitutional observation that the purpose of people wearing these face coverings is not, is to intimidate people like me as well as our non citizen community members.

And that when I am out engaged in First Amendment protected activity, I should not fear being shot by an unidentified agent of the Federal Government.

Also, as somebody who's worked in the domestic violence community in the past, what we are hearing now is that women who are victims of domestic violence are afraid to come forward and ask for the help of of our local law enforcement out of fear that our law enforcement is engaged in collaboration with federal agents on immigration activity.

So I just want to put a face to the people who are feeling threatened and hope that you will support this bill. Thank you for allowing me to testify.

Thank you very much. Next, Jeidy Anne Petalver, on Zoom

Aloha Chair, Vice Chair and Members of the Committee. My name is JJeidy Anne Petalver and I'm testifying in support of HB 1886 HD1 which establishes clear elements and standards related to state and federal collaboration in immigration enforcement operations. It also strengthens accountability requirements for law enforcement identification and facial coverings and public operations.

I am currently a student at the University of Hawaii at Manoa working towards a Bachelor's degree in social work. With my degree, my hope is to bring awareness and support to marginalized communities. I am a daughter of Filipino immigrant parents and seeing recent events have made me scared for every minority. HB 1881, sorry.

HB 1886 HD1 would help cultivate a relationship built on trust and transparency between the people and law enforcement. Clear identification standards help protect residents rights and also protect responsible officers by ensuring accountability and reducing misunderstandings. Overall, Chair, Vice Chair, and Members of the Committee, I respectfully ask that you vote to pass HB 1886 HD1. Thank you for the opportunity.

Thank you very much. Hope Fuentes.

Hello. Thank you so much for giving me the opportunity to testify. My name is Hope Fuentes. I am a junior at Waialua High School and many of my peers, including myself, are very worried about the way ICE is coming to our streets. Especially worried that they will be soon in our community.

That is why we are in strong support of this bill being passed and believe that this bill will keep our streets peaceful and our law enforcement transparent. Thank you so much.

Thank you very much. We received a total of 110, 111 testimonies in support and one in opposition. That's all that has said they wanted to testify. Is there anyone else here or on Zoom that wish to testify on House Bill 1886? If not, questions, Members? If not, thank you very much to all the testifiers.

I appreciate that. This is a, this is a very important matter and it takes courage to stand up and give testimony. So thank you to all the testifiers. Okay, let's move on to the next measure. House Bill 2540, House draft 1 relating to law enforcement.

This measure establishes provisions limiting state and federal collaboration for purposes of immigration enforcement operations. It requires law enforcement agencies operating in the state to establish and publicly post written policies regarding civil immigration enforcement, including procedures governing law enforcement officers authority to make any inquiry into a person's civil immigration status.

It prohibits law enforcement officers from initiating or prolonging a stop, detention, or arrest of a person for the purpose of determining the person's civil immigration status. It establishes that as a policy of the Department of Law Enforcement that civil immigration activity involving state or county participation or facilities shall only proceed under certain conditions.

It prohibits state and county involvement in civil immigration enforcement activity in certain locations and requires the Department of Law Enforcement to assist state and county agencies in maintaining compliance with civil immigration enforcement policy. First up, we have the Office of the Public Defender. Ms. Cheng, welcome.

Good afternoon again, we echo what you have previously heard about some of the overlapping provisions of these measures, and we defer, of course, to the Committee to streamline and put whatever language is important.

We just want to highlight that we, of course, support the overall intent of this measure and stand in strong support of all of the things that it intended to achieve, specifically highlighting in this provision the written policy requirements.

We do believe that is another avenue to continue to promote transparency amongst law enforcement as well as for the community. So I'll be available for questions. Thank you.

Thank you very much. Next, Veronica Mendoza on zoom. Not present. Next, Liza Ryan-Gill. You don't have to run. It's okay.

I know we're trying to get through these. Aloha Chair, Vice Chair, Members of the Committee. I think sometimes it's helpful to take a step back when looking at these bills to make sure that we all have the same understanding. We have criminal law and then we have civil immigration law.

Those two things are not the same, and they are not enforced by the same entities. So when we talk about the separation of our local law enforcement from immigrations and customs enforcement, it doesn't mean that Immigrations and Customs Enforcement, ICE, is not allowed to do their job.

They have every right in all of these bills, none of them impede ICE from being able to do the federal work that they have been given the statutory authority to do.

But what is so clear, even just listening into the description that you gave, when we talk about not inquiring into somebody's immigration status, if you are a local police officer. The reason why you wouldn't inquire is that you have no authority over that aspect of whether, because that is civil immigration law.

So it doesn't mean anything to you if you are a police officer because you don't have that authority to inform for civil immigration law. Only the feds do. So I think some of the things that we're doing here is just making sure that it's clear that everybody knows what their role and responsibility is within this system.

I think what is also challenging to deal with in this current moment is that we are seeing lots of different agencies being pulled in to and being given the powers of Immigrations and Customs Enforcement.

So whether that is our Department of Drug Enforcement, our Homeland Security investigation, there's many federal agencies that have been now been tasked with these authorities that normally just reside within ERO or specific elements of Department of Homeland Security.

So the reason these kinds of bills come forward is because there has been a massive expansion on the federal side of who they are trying to, to have do this work. And we just have to be very clear on our side as a state that we have an obligation to the Constitution.

And one of the reasons why we would have a bill like this move forward is because a local police officer cannot hold somebody just based on what they perceive as their, as their immigration status. First of all, that's racial profiling. And second of all, that's probably a Fourth Amendment violation of their unlawful search and seizure.

You don't have a reason except for that you suspect that they might have a civil immigration violation and that's why you're holding them. So this is just to make sure the state is not liable for breaching somebody's constitutional rights.

Thank you. I appreciate that. That's helpful for all of us who are new to immigration law. So thanks for that primer. Next, Mandy Fernandes, American Civil Liberties Union of Hawaii.

Good afternoon, Chair, Vice Chair, Members of the Committee, Mandy Fernandes, on behalf of the ACLU of Hawaii, largely stand on our written testimony. And a lot of what I testified on for HB 1886 applies here as well.

I'll highlight that what we're concerned about at the federal level and at the state level is not just the deputization of our local officers to carry out civil immigration enforcement, but also a deputization of our federal officers for generalized policing here.

And the Federal Administration has really made it a strategy to multiply its force by co opting local and state law enforcement. But we also don't want there to just be blurring of the lines where people can't tell who's local police, people who can't tell who is BPB or ICE.

And so that's what we're really trying to avoid here. So the task force provisions of HB 1886 and 2540 are really essential, too. Thank you.

Thank you very much. Next, Tim Huycke.

Aloha again. Again, just for purposes, my name is Tim Huycke and I did serve 34 years as a police officer. Immigration, again, repeating myself. Immigration is a federal issue.

Any police officer who is certified by a State Academy, such as the state of Hawaii, any city or county officer who graduates from police academy that's certified of state of Hawaii does not have the authority to federal law. Local police have their own issues to deal with.

They should not have to do the federal law enforcement's job as well. Federal law enforcement should deal with what they deal with. Local police deal with what we deal with. And again, local police have no jurisdiction to be enforcing immigration laws, which again, as repeated earlier stated earlier, it's actually a civil issue. Anyways.

I also want to repeat from earlier a couple of facts, starting with detention. The court case Terry versus Ohio defines when a detention can be made versus arrest, and in the court case US versus Sharp identifies how long that detention can be, which generally can last no longer than 20 minutes. Thank you.

Thank you very much. Next we have Christine Andrews on Zoom. Please proceed.

Hi. Yes, thank you. So I'll stand mostly on my written testimony.

I do want to just point out that in my role as a Know Your Rights educator, one of the things that I teach people is how to differentiate between federal agents, their uniforms, our local law enforcement, Hawaii State Sheriffs, the Department of Land and Natural Resources, Conservation officers.

And so for community members who are fearful of immigration enforcement activity, I try to teach them that they can trust our local law enforcement, that our local sheriffs and DLNR are not engaged in immigration enforcement.

So I do feel it's super important for the safety of our community members, the perceived safety that they can go to work or to school, go to court. It's really important that we do clearly delineate these. And having those written policies, as was mentioned previously, is super important for that. Thank you for the time.

Certainly. Thank you very much for your testimony. So, I want to let you know we've received 96 testimonies in support, two in opposition and one with comments. Is there anyone else wishing to testify on House Bill 2540? Please introduce yourself and proceed.

Michael Golojuch Jr., He/him pronouns, on behalf of Pride at Work Hawaii. We are where the labor movement meets the queer rights movement. We stand in strong support. No shockers. At least hopefully not. On this bill, we see it as a states rightsbBill.

We do not want if a police officer were to detain an individual, along comes an ICE gestapo slave catcher and deports them to another country or kills them as we are now, seeing as they were losing individuals in these concentration camps, would the state be liable for that?

Because they were the ones a police officer, state police officer, county police officer, held the person, allowed them to go into custody, the federal custody, and then them to be legally detained, kidnapped, and shot, killed. We've seen them malnutrition. And we have, why this is also a queer issue is they are no longer tracking somebody's gender identity.

They do not recognize, as we do here in the state of Hawaii, that gender is a spectrum. There are, they're losing their humanity, these people who just because of the color of their skin, they are misidentifying them. So we encourage you to pass this bill.

Keep our cops away from these untrained goons, for lack of a better term. I'm surprised, I'm not really not surprised that Chopo's not here. Why would they want to have their Members to be exposed to these horrific actions?

I know as a taxpayer here, I do not want to see one thin dime of my taxpayer dollars going to help do anything to do with the ICE and their slave catchers. So please pass this bill. Mahalo.

Thank you very much. Anyone else wishing to testify in this measure? Please introduce yourself.

I'm Joli Tokusato with UNITE HERE! Local 5. We represent 10,000 working people in Hawaii and most of our workers are immigrants. And we have, we have been in discussions with our sister locals across the country, and we feel that these kinds of bills are strongly needed here, even here in Hawaii. So, you know, we urge you to pass HB1886, 2540, and 1839. Thank you.

Thank you very much. Anyone else wishing to testify on HB 2540?

Good afternoon again, Chair, Vice Chair, and Members. Tina Sablan, again from the Legal Clinic. And again, we submitted written testimony in support of this Bill as well, recognizing that there are overlapping provisions and very similar amendments between this bill and House Bill 1886 HD1

For House Bill 2540 HD1, the particular provisions that we hope to see preserved as legislation progresses, some of which are mirrored in the other bill, include clear restrictions on the use of state resources to assist civil immigration enforcement, limitations on state deputization of federal officers, as my colleague Mandy Fernandes from the ACLU highlighted, and guardrails on federal state cooperative agreements and task forces that risk rights violations or support civil immigration enforcement.

We also fully support the bill's requirements for the adoption and public posting of written civil immigration enforcement policies for all law enforcement agencies and the standards these policies should follow including restrictions on civil immigration enforcement activity, especially in sensitive locations, restrictions on the collection and sharing of immigration related personal data, requirements for public reporting of civil immigration requests and the treatment of immigration based threats or abuse as prohibited acts in the workplace.

Mahalo for your consideration of all of these important measures, especially in this time of escalating immigration enforcement and violations of constitutional rights.

Thank you for your testimony. Sorry I didn't, we did receive your testimony, sorry I didn't call you. Anyone else wishing to testify on this measure? If not question members? Seeing none. Thank you very much to the testifiers. Again, very important measure. Takes courage to stand up and testify and I appreciate you doing that.

Let's move on to House Bill 1839 relating to immigration. This measure requires state and county law enforcement agencies to notify an individual in the custody of a state or county law enforcement agency of their rights before any interview with the United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement pertaining to certain matters regarding civil immigration violations can commence.

It designates all records relating to the United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement access to detained individuals provided by a state or local law enforcement agency as public records.

It requires state and county law enforcement agencies that have provided the United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement access to a detained individual within the previous year to hold two public forms per year. First up, we have Office of Information Practices. Their testimony was sent. I refer Members to her written testimony with comments.

Next we have Ms. Cheng, Office of the Public Defender.

Good afternoon. Again, the Office of the Public Defender supports this measure, noting, of course, our strong support behind notifying people of their constitutional rights.

The requirement to provide something in writing is significant oftentimes and I cannot convey strongly enough how intimidating it is to be in the presence of a law enforcement officer, especially when you are in custody.

The requirement of written notice of rights is critical to make sure that they have been advised appropriately and that they have the opportunity to accept or decline what is being presented to them.

We have also, as part of our written testimony, suggested that we amend or add to the bill that these individuals, in this situation, should also be advised. in writing, of the Miranda warnings. And would also note, just as a technicality, that we also believe the bill should be consistent with Hawaii Revised statute, Section 571-31.8, which does require that juveniles in custody shall have contact, shall have contact with an attorney and to the extent practicable, have contact with a parent or guardian.

Thank you for the opportunity to comment.

Thank you very much for your testimony. Next, Veronica Mendoza on Zoom Not present. Next, Liza Ryan Gill. Welcome.

Aloha Chair, Vice Chair, Members of the Committee. We're really excited about this bill in particular. And again it come. We had a bill like this last session. It is oftentimes called the Truth Act. If anybody watches like police shows or crime shows you're familiar with when somebody gets Mirandized and told their rights.

Now we've kind of called this bill our "Miranda plus Bill" because it's if you are being held in our local custody and you've been arrested for something, your information went into a national database that ICE has access to.

They see, so if I was arrested, they see Liza Ryan Gill came up, they come to the police station, they say they want to talk to me about something. Now in that particular case, that person has the right to deny or consent that interview. But oftentimes they don't know that they have that right.

And what's more is if it's Immigrations and Customs Enforcement, there's a high likelihood that that individual is limited English proficient. And therefore it is their understanding their rights is only valuable if they can understand the language that it's being told to them in.

So this is one of the reasons why we have put this bill forward because Title 6 law under the Civil Rights Act of 1964 is still valid and everybody is. That means that everybody should have access to language access to be able to understand something in the language that they can understand.

Especially if the consequences of not having having language access, in that particular moment, means that they might sign a paper that leads to their expedited removal without being able to talk to their counsel. So it's a really high stakes moment for somebody who really needs to understand what they are consenting to.

And therefore we believe it needs to be in a language they can understand.

Thank you very much. Next. Mandy Fernandes, American Civil Liberties Union of Hawaii.

Good afternoon. Mandy Fernandes, on behalf of ACLU Hawaii, we strongly support this measure. Regardless of your immigration status, you have rights to due process.

And as a state, we're very limited in our tools and our ability to make sure in any way that the Federal Government is respecting these rights of people who are in their custody or being questioned.

But what we can do is ensure that our state agencies, our local agencies, are notifying people of their rights in a language they can understand. Because like my colleague before me testified, your rights are less meaningful if you don't know that they exist.

And people can't take advantage of their rights and use their rights to the fullest extent of the law. If they don't understand, if they don't understand that those rights are there. We strongly urge you to support this measure. Thank you.

Thank you very much. Next, Ben Kreps, Public First Law Center.

Good afternoon, Chair, Vice Chair, Members of the Committee. My name is Ben Kreps. I'm a Staff Attorney with the Public First Law Center Hawaii Nonprofit Organization dedicated to open government. We support the intent of this measure. We've offered in our testimony some language to better effectuate that intent regarding the public records piece.

So essentially, as written, the bill just restates the law as it relates to the public records law. And our experience has been, and we've made requests like this for information such as this type, and we've also assisted folks getting this information and by and large agencies will deny it.

So if it's the intent of this Committee to make this a mandatory disclosure and to actually provide the access, then we suggest making the exemptions inapplicable. So we've provided some language in our written testimony and we have had a chance to look at OIP's proposed amendments, and we're generally supportive.

And they do tend to make the the Bill a little bit more clear and available for any questions.

Thank you very much. Mr. Kreps referred to Office of Information Practices, OIP. Thank you, sir. Next, Michael Golojuch.

Good afternoon again, Michael Golojuch Jr., he/him pronouns, President of Private Work Hawaii. We stand in strong support of this bill. Everybody needs to know their rights, and putting it in writing in a language that they understand sounds like basic science, just makes common sense to make sure people know. I wish all lawmakers do that.

Once you're on US Soil, you have constitutional rights no matter what your immigration status is. And so if lawmakers don't know that, not everybody up and down the police office, police force will know that as well. So we encourage you to pass this law making sure that people know their rights so they can defend themselves. Mahalo.

Thank you very much. Next, Tina Sablan, the Legal Clinic.

Good afternoon, Chair, Vice Chair and Members. Tina Sablan, from the Legal Clinic we submitted a written testimony in full support of this bill, which strengthens due process protections for individuals in state or county custody when federal immigration authorities seek access for interviews or custody transfers.

Briefly, this bill requires informed written consent. Again, in a language that the individual in custody understands and ensures they are advised of their right to decline an interview and to request an attorney. These are necessary safeguards.

According to data obtained by the Deportation Data Project and analyzed by TLC, between October 2023 and October 2025, ICE placed approximately 132 detainers on individuals in custody in Hawaii. Detainers are requests to law enforcement agencies to hold people for up to 48 hours beyond their scheduled release date so ICE can conduct interviews or transfer custody.

Detainers raise constitutional concerns and increase liability exposure for agencies that hold people in continued detention without probable cause or judicial warrants. Compliance with detainers is discretionary, not mandatory. The vast majority of detainers issued in Hawaii, 83% were for people in state or county facilities.

Less than half of those individuals actually had criminal convictions and we know from anecdotal accounts from defense attorneys that they have had clients disappear from local custody, taken into ICE detention with no notice or information even to their attorneys.

Clear notice of rights, informed consent and access to counsel are essential to prevent coercion and uphold due process. Especially when people in custody face serious immigration consequences and separation from their families and communities. We urge the committees to advance this bill.

Thank you very much. Next, Christine Andrews on Zoom.

Aloha, thank you for the opportunity to testify. I'm going to stand with my written testimony, except I want to highlight that I'm a ""Know Your Rights" educator. I've conducted dozens of "Know Your Rights" trainings statewide for hundreds of people over the course of the last year.

And you know, as a lawyer, our rights under the Constitution are foundational to what it means to be America. They're what separate us from other types of countries that we would consider anti democratic.

It is, shocks the conscience to think that we could have people being held in local law enforcement with local law enforcement agencies who then would be transferred to ICE or allowed to have interactions with federal agents without knowing their rights.

It has so much great potential for harm and also has the great potential to be a violation of the rights that we find so dear. So I very strongly support this bill as a necessary step in the right direction of ensuring that the rights of all people are protected regardless of immigration status as the Constitution requires.

Thank you.

Thank you very much Members and Members of the public. We've received 96 testimonies in support, five in opposition and two with comments. Is there anyone else wishing to testify on House Bill 1839? If not questions, Members? Seeing none. Thank you very much to the testifiers. Appreciate that.

Just so everyone knows, we're going to go through all the bills on the hearing notice and take testimony on them and we'll do decision making on the bills at the very end of the agenda. So if you want to stay with us, that's great. But just know that's what we're going to do.

Okay, we're moving on to the next Bill. House Bill 1769 House Draft 1 relating to correctional facilities. This measure requires the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation to incrementally return committed felons incarcerated in private out of state correctional institutions to in state correctional facilities and requires report to the Legislature. And first up, we have. Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation. Welcome, sir.

Hey. Good afternoon. Chair, Co Chair, Members of the Committee. I am Michael Hoffman. I'm the Institutions Division Administrator for DCR.

That's the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation. If you don't know what DCR is. Go ahead.

Thank you.

Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation opposes House Bill 1769 House Draft 1, which seeks to require DCR to reduce the number of inmates housed at private out of state correctional institutions by 25% no later than July 1, 2029 and beginning July 1, 2031 to further reduce the number of inmates housed in private out of state correctional institutions by 5% in that year.

As written, the measure seeks to reduce the mainland inmate population without regard to DCRs in state population for male convicted felons or DCRs capacity and or ability to appropriately house, treat and care for the affected committed felons. DCR understands the intent of HB 1769 HD1 to return committed felons incarcerated in private mainland facilities to Hawaii.

DCR shares the concerns raised about housing inmates in facilities far from home and would have returned the inmates long ago but for the lack of facilities in which to house care for treat them, including appropriate rehabilitative programs.

Therefore, DCR cannot agree with this proposal as there is currently no space available in our only male medium security prison which is the Halawa Correctional Facility. The Halawa Correctional Facility has a design capacity of approximately 496 offenders. However, at present there are 817 convicted male felons housed at that facility which is quite above design capacity.

Currently, there are 797 convicted male felons being housed at Saguaro Correctional Center in Eloy, Arizona. Should be noted that DCR does not have the authority to turn away offenders sentenced to jail or prison by the courts, nor those re sentenced by the courts from probation to prison terms.

Likewise, DCR is required to accept all parole and probation violators where the court or the Hawaii Paroling Authority has issued a warrant of arrest that has been executed. Therefore, DCR has no way of knowing what its population will be until they arrive at its doorstep.

For example, at present Judiciary has approximately 11,000 offenders on probation supervision statewide, if only 10% of the sentenced felon probationers, approximately 1100 were resentenced to prison, the state's correctional system, which is already severely strained with insufficient capacity to house all our current inmates in Hawaii facilities would be completely overwhelmed.

It should also be noted that the judiciary may have a substantial backlog of felony level criminal trials whereby hundreds of individuals could be convicted and sentenced to prison, some of which are sentenced felony probationers facing revocations and resentencing to prison.

To house these offenders located in Hawaii who may be ordered into DCR's correctional facilities, we only have eight facilities, jails, and prisons combined, which are old, manpower intensive and constantly in need of major costly repairs. DCR has previously pointed out the age and limited capacities of its facilities in the state.

Because DCR's correctional facilities medium custody level beds are currently filled, returned to 25% or approximately 200 of the 799 male inmates currently housed at Saguaro, any lawyers on it to Hawaii will require a new medium security prison. DCR estimates the cost to build such facility in Hawaii to be between 8 to 900 million.

If the goal is to ultimately return all inmates.

Sir, could you please summarize?

Almost done. Depending on the design program space. So finally, having direct knowledge understanding of the space requirements to comply with the measure, bring back these offenders.

We are asking it and it must be tied to the construction of a new medium security male correctional facility in Hawaii. Otherwise if we start bringing them back without something like that, it's going to lead to overcrowding, inhumane conditions of confinement which could trigger Department of Justice intervention.

Thank you for giving us the opportunity to testify and I'll be here for questions.

Thank you very much. Christin Johnson, Hawaii Correctional System Oversight Commission.

Aloha Chair, Vice Chair, Members of the Committee. My name is Christin Johnson. I'm the Oversight Coordinator with the Hawaii Correctional System Oversight Commission. The Commission supports this measure first and foremost, obviously, having a facility out of state separates people from their home, their, their community. And so that's deeply concerning for the Commission.

But the other thing that people don't always realize is that out of state private institutions run under their own policies and procedures that don't align with the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation.

A very quick example of this is a program referred to as SHIP that is at Saguaro where people are housed under very, very restrictive conditions for at least a year. For the first four months they are housed, they're locked down for 23 hours. The next four months it's 22 hours. The next four months, it's 21 hours.

This is not something we have in the state of Hawaii. And so this is just one example of the differences there. The other piece that I want to mention is that private facilities are driven by profit motivations.

There are many, many lawsuits across the country that highlight that when you have a private facility that's driven by profit, that comes with the expense of safety programming and also humane conditions. The last piece that actually isn't in my testimony that I wanted to mention is the comment about capacity.

So when the commission looks at all of the people who are in the correctional facilities, what we have found is that minimum and community facilities are severely underutilized to the point where the Department could actually move almost 236, I believe it is, people out of Halawa to these lower level facilities that they're eligible to be in right now

And so when the Department talks about capacity, I think it's very important to understand that there is capacity. It's not unreasonable for the Department to take, you know, 25% back home and continue to work on that.

And if anybody at this table would like those numbers, I'd be more than happy to share what we have. Thank you.

Thank you very much. Next, Halyey Cheng, Office of the Public Defender.

Good afternoon again. The Office of the Public Defender strongly supports this measure.

As the agency that represents the vast majority of individuals incarcerated because of our Hawaii legal system, criminal legal system, we can share firsthand the devastating impact of shipping our community members who are incarcerated to an out of state prison. The anxiety, the detrimental impacts that it has not only to those who are incarcerated.

Some may not have empathy or compassion for those individuals, but for what it does to their family and loved ones, as well as cannot be understated. We also want to echo the remarks of Ms. Johnson. We obviously do not know all of the ins and outs of the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation.

Ms. Johnson and DCR are best suited to answer those questions. But anecdotally what we can share is that we often get the feedback that our clients cannot be moved to a different facility because they are classified as medium. You'll hear that distinction and as you've heard this afternoon, medium, minimum, or community.

And as Ms. Johnson has said, our minimum and community facilities have space. We have the space to transfer people and we have the capacity to house additional people in our minimum and community custody facilities.

The solution is not to build a new prison that's going to cost in excess of the millions and millions of dollars that you've heard about. Our belief is that if it takes a deeper look, and this Committee taking a deeper look at the classification system that the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation uses and the way that our other facilities are being utilized, we think that is really important.

We cannot express more strongly our support of this and our desire to help assist bring our community members back home where they belong. Thank you.

Thank you very much. Next. Representative Ohana Hopakele on Zoom, Kamauu. No. Next. Kat Brady, Community alliance on Prisons.

Good afternoon, Chair, Vice Chair, Members of the Committee. Kat Brady testifying in strong support of this measure for Community Alliance on Prisons. We actually would prefer that Hawaii cancels the contract with for profit prisons. We understand what's going on. We believe that, as people have alluded to, that we have minimum, two minimum facilities that have space.

Kulani has a capacity, an operational capacity of 200. We have 79 people there, so their operational rate is 39.5%. Waiava Correctional Facility has an operational capacity of 51.2%. They have an operational capacity of 334 people and we have 171 people there. So we think that there's lots that can be done.

And if you read the Committee report from PBS, they actually mention the classification system. This has been an issue in Hawaii. In 2007, there was a report done that showed that Hawaii over classifies people. So we need to understand what is going on.

So when we're talking about building another billion dollar facility for medium security people, let's make sure that the right people would be in there and not people who should be classified as minimum or community custody. Thank you so much.

Thank you very much. Next. McKenna Woodward, Office of Hawaiian Affairs,

Chair, Vice Chair and Members of the Committee.

We can't hear you. Could you speak up?

Can you hear me now?

Barely.

Okay. Something happened. Yeah. Okay, I'll go ahead and proceed. Hopefully this is loud enough.

Yes.

Okay. Mahalo for the opportunity to testify. As mentioned by previous testifiers, this bill establishes a phased accountable plan to reduce Hawaii's reliance on out of state prison and requires regular reporting on progress toward bringing our paʻahao home.

I won't restate what previous testifiers already mentioned, but I do just want to underscore that we started this practice back in 1995 of sending our paʻahao over to the continent. It was always supposed to be a temporary practice.

And now that we have, you know, other options available at our disposal, as mentioned by some of the other testifiers, increasing flow between some of the facilities and reclassifying, you know, the security on, on some of the paʻahao, then we believe it's time, it's long past time to end this practice and bring our paʻahao home. So mahalo for the opportunity to testify.

Thank you very much. Next, Carrie Ann Shirota. Welcome.

Aloha Chair, Vice Chair, Committee Members. Carrie Ann Shirota, community advocate, as well as an attorney. And I'm here to testify in strong support of this measure.

I know we keep referring it to as out of state transfers, but we could also call it out of country transfers for all the Aloha Aina patriots and for those who consider Hawaii to be occupied country. This is a measure that would introduce good public policy to reverse bad public policy.

In 1995, as a result of overcrowding, Governor Cayetano made the decision. There was the threat of this consent decree looming because of overcrowding. And so he made the decision, a declaration to temporarily transfer our people to out of state private prisons in Texas.

Since that time, people have been transferred to Texas, to Mississippi, to Minnesota, Oklahoma, a whole host of number of states. Every single Governor since Governor Cayetano has announced publicly that it is their desire to bring our people home. And yet we have made strides. We have decreased the number of people.

If you look at my testimony, there was a peak of transferring over 2,000 people around 2008. And so I just want to applaud all those who made that happen. But there's still so much more to do.

And we can look at other examples of other states who have determined that the policy of transferring people out of state is detrimental not only to the individual, but to their families, and that it does not enhance public safety for people who are disconnected from family to services to Aina.

California started this failed experiment of sending people out of state later than Hawaii. And in 2019, Governor Gavin Newsom made good on his promise, which was to end out of state prisoner transfers, to end these contracts and to bring their people home.

Now, that was done through a number of data driven strategies and we need to employ that. It is not only the Kuleana of the Department of Corrections, it is a number of systems, but much of it is the Kuleana of the Department of Corrections. You've heard repeatedly that they don't have the facilities.

And you can see in my testimony, I cited data from the Department of Corrections on population reports. Even if you look years back, there have been years of empty beds, not only in the minimum security facilities, Kulani and Waiawa, but also in the community.

And for those who know a little bit about the way that this flows, is that even people who have felons, who've been sent out of state could be transferred within one year on their time left between either maxing out or the parole.

And we could even increase that length of time time and have people transition to their communities, start the work furlough program early. And I don't have the specific data for today, but there are a number of empty beds in the work furlough and extended furlough program.

And that is a proven, proven strategy to help people successfully reintegrate to have a job, to start saving money again. California reduced this practice, ended it from over 10,000 people to now none. We need to set the public policy that's in alignment with every single Governor and the people of Hawaii to return our people home.

And also what's in the kuleana of the Department is this classification system. For I would say maybe two to three years. I've heard the Department say that they are reviewing their classification system and that they're going to change their classification system. It does not take that long to change a classification system.

We are notorious for having people at a higher custody level. The higher the custody level, above minimum, minimum, close custody and maximum, the more that we can justify keeping people out of state.

And I can give you examples of clients and even family members who have had lower custody levels that could have been transferred and moved into the community, but were not. And there are a number of people, as you know, who have died in sorrow, died in other states prisons. There's extreme amounts of violence.

And that practice started our security threat group, which is gangs in our prisons, which we are now having to deal with. So the idea is not just to bring people back to Halawa, but to move people out of Halawa into the other facilities, into the community and bring our people home. It's time set the public policy.

And please consider the amendments I've made which is waiting to 2029 to do a 25% decrease. I would suggest that you actually set it for this year 2026, July 1st to take effect.

Bring 5% of the people back home the next year, about 15% and stagger it because there will always be some excuse from the Department why they can't do something.

And if they invested all the money for consultants, people who are making money to build these prisons that we don't need and invested it into hiring people like council for state governments, other states that have successfully decarcerated and returned their people home. We wouldn't have this conversation today because we would have brought everybody home.

So It's a matter of political will, and I thank you for your leadership.

Thank you very much. We received a total of 20 testimonies in support, one in opposition, one with comments. Is there anyone who wishes to provide oral testimony on this measure? If so, please introduce yourself.

Thank you. Josh Frost with ACLU of Hawaii Policy Advocates. I think you have our written testimony. Maybe we just didn't.

Yes.

Tell you that we were going to be here, but here we are. I don't want to belabor the point. I think we've, we've heard, you know, you've heard why this bill is necessary.

We offered comments because we don't think the bill does, in its current form, brings people home fast enough. As you heard right. This, this is a practice that the state's been doing for 30 years. And by our math, roughly, it could take at least another 30 under the HD1 to bring folks back.

We think this is something that needs to happen immediately. And, you know, we've heard from the Oversight Commission and others that DCR can do it now. It is a matter of political will. I think that there are people, you know, the DCR says it's not possible, that there's overcrowding. I just want to suggest that it is.

That all of this, this conversation, is a symptom of Hawaii's criminal justice system that is broken. And this is an opportunity to force the conversation, bring folks home, closer to family and community, and begin to take a really hard look at our criminal justice system. Mahalo.

Thank you very much. Anyone else wishing to testify on this measure? Yes. Please introduce yourself.

Hello, my name is Maisona Eldeger, and I'm in support. You know, I just believe that the Department of Corrections has just too much power. In the 90s, the life without, they were thriving out at Kulani. You know, they have life without.

So they would be able to make crafts and sell it at, you know, at the Merri Monarch. They would do a lot of things to help support themselves for a lifetime. When they moved. Who's going to support them for, you know, to buy them food to that camp commissary.

And I just think that this, this bill would keep them accountable to get things done. And of course, of course, Prince Kuhio said the only way my people can heal is to put them back on their soil. And most of these lifers are Hawaiians. They're Kānaka Maoli So I ask that you guys please support.

Thank you very much. And, ma', am, if I could ask you to sign up so we can keep a record I appreciate that. Mr. Golojuch. Did you want to testify? Please proceed.

Good afternoon. Michael Golojuch Jr, he/him pronouns, Pride at Work Hawaii. We stand in support of this bill, not strong support because it doesn't do it fast enough. The recidivism rate for a private prison is greater than that of a public prison.

Why we are spending money to spend more money to make money for private corporations back on the continent makes absolutely no sense to me. And that money should be spent here at home. There is the will to do, there is the way to do it. There just has to be, as been said earlier, the political will.

There needs to be a revamping of the entire judicial system when it comes to how we warehouse our criminals. Because let's be true, let's be honest. There's no rehabilitation happening. You hear the horror stories of what's happening in our prisons. If we really wanted to do something, we would do this.

Get rid of the debtors prison at OCC, bring our people home, have them back on their Aina, take care of this and stop filling the coffers of these mega corporations, private prisons that just cost us more and more money. So I encourage you to pass this bill, amend it, make it better, bring our people home.

Thank you. Thank you very much. Next, Jamee Mahealani Miller on zoom.

Hi. Aloha Chair, Aloha Vice Chair, Aloha Committee. I agree with all the testimony that has been provided and also I did submit written testimony. I just want to say that last week I was at Saguaro. We did Hawaiian programming there.

And most of the men that were participating in the program had spent 20, 30 years away from Hawaii at various facilities. So I just want to share what they said to me. And they said I, I did a survey and I asked questions about them wanting to return home. They do want to return home.

They want to return to Kulani. They do not want to return to, to Halawa. But they also feel that the state has forgotten about them. One man that has been there for 30 years, he says they are in exile, that are, that's his word. And that they, they do want to come back and return.

That the only connection that they have to Hawaii is when we come and provide Hawaiian programming. They feel connected. They, they feel that, that we outside organizations are the ones that are showing them aloha. They feel no aloha from the state. They feel forgotten.

So based on what everyone else and what they feel themselves, that is what I want to share with you right now. So thank you.

Thank you very much, Ms. Miller and to let you know we did receive your testimony. I just didn't, did not know you were going to be there on Zoom. Thank you.

Okay, bye. Bye.

Anyone else wishing to testify in this measure? Yes. Please introduce yourself.

Good afternoon, Chairman,Vice Chairman and Committee Members. My name is Nelson Sua. We were labeled the Brotherhood of Crime in the 90s. Collectively, as a family, we've done over 230 years of prison time. My cousin Danny Tupola, that's right behind me, he did 42 years in prison and just recently got out.

Now, I share this because we come from a different side of the fence. A lot of these are brothers and sisters that are on there. We're not even. We're talking about the men. Nobody's talking about the women. Some of these women that have been transferred out have actually.

Some of the prisons on the East Coast actually have been raped by guards and were pregnant. You know, so there's a lot of things like that that happen. A lot of misclassification of some of these inmates. There is a lot of space here.

You know, I speak in the prisons, I go to Waiala and there's a lot of land, you know, and I, I believe that if we do not start to really help them and bring them back home there, they, they start to kick, they have the probability of getting worse.

Right, because now you're in, in, in an arena with other nationalities, right? So we need to buckle down because what, what people don't realize is that inmates have become human cattle, right? These private prisons, that's why their rules are different. Because if they violate there, they can keep these inmates for another year.

You know, say if it's 40,000 inmate, 2,000 inmates, that's $80 million. That's serious money, you know, and I'm just, I'm glad that I'm here. I came here for another bill.

But I'm just letting you know from our side, from what we know from being on that side of the fence, a lot of these guys, women as well, it's better that they're home. So I just wanted to share that. Thank you guys.

Thank you very much. Appreciate it. We have one more person on Zoom that said they wish to testify, representing the Ohana Unity Party. Please proceed. Introduce yourself.

Hello, guys, it's Pikachu. Aloha Chair. I'll make it short and quick. I do want to support this Bill. I'm glad Nelson Sua stepped up and spoke about, you know, with the prison like system. I can only watch from Zoom. I was on the bus, I made on the zoom. So please pass this bill.

For technical clarity, amendments and everything else. So please pass this bill. Thank you very much. Have compassion. Aloha

Thank you. Okay. Anyone else wishing to testify this, please introduce yourself.

Hi. My name is Joanne Keaulana. And. So today.

Okay. Aloha, Chair and members of the committee. Thank you for the opportunity to testify today in strong support of HB 1628 before the Hawaii State Legislature.

We're not-- we're not quite there yet. We're still on the bill before that.

Oh. Which one is that?

1769.

Oh, okay. 17-- what?

So I'll call you-- it's okay, Sister. It's okay, Sister. I'll call you up for the next one. I'll call you up for the next one. It's okay. It's okay. No problem. Anyone else wishing to testify on House Bill 1769? If not, questions, members? Mr. Shimizu and then Mr. Garcia.

DCR, please.

Director Johnson, please proceed.

Thank you, Director. Thank you for your work. I know it's a hard job. You know, it's been mentioned that there's an unknown quantity resentence or other incoming. Do we know, like, what is the average number, year, or month we're talking about? Just to get an idea--

Of probation as reset as the prison?

All incoming, cause--

I can provide that. I can provide an average number of intakes to our jails and prisons for both pretrial sentences committed and sentence felons for whatever period the committee would like.

Okay, because I--

What's it-- do you want to give them some specific requests? Because then Director Johnson can get that information and get it to the committee.

Let's say the last five years, then, if that's not difficult.

The average monthly intake by type, pretrial sentence felon, sentence--

Yeah, because that's been referenced as a sticking point because you don't know how many people are coming in, so that's a valid factor to deal with. So I just want to get an idea of that. Thank you.

Okay. Thank you. Mr. Garcia.

Thanks, Chair. For Director. A few testifiers mentioned that there's a few hundred beds available in our local facilities, I think our two prisons. Your testimony here says DCR cannot agree with this proposal as there's currently no space available. I know that's our only male medium-security prison in Halawa, but how many beds are available and are all of those beds on standby for the intakes?

No, so there are two facilities that the previous testifier referred to is the Waiawa Correctional Facility here on Oahu and the Kulani Correction Facility on the Big Island. Both are work camps and they're minimum-security facilities with no fences. The inmate-- the vast majority of the inmates in Arizona are medium-security inmates.

We are having our reclassification system reviewed. We're done with the review. We're doing a pilot program now. Dr. Janet Davidson from Chaminade and I completed the review. So now we're doing a pilot project that started in February to use the amended assessment instrument, classification instrument, against the current one to check the validity. That will be done this summer.

Once we have finished this summer, then we will implement the new system. We do anticipate that a greater number of inmates will be classified as minimum-security sooner than they are now and they'll be moved. With respect to the 200 plus people that are minimal custody sitting in Arizona and Halawa, that's just not true.

We moved the inmates from Arizona, the vast majority of them. They've already been moved here. There was 90 something of them, I think. The bath already moved here. The 194 sitting at Halawa, most cannot go to minimum-security facility because they're already in programs-- or they're already in programs, we don't disrupt the programs, or they have medical conditions that do not allow them to go to the minimum-security facility because we don't have 24/7 medical care doses.

Or they have other restrictions, separating restrictions where we can't put them in the minimum-security facility because there are patients in those facilities that are either co-defendants or they're the family members of victims of a crime and so unable to commit.

So there are nuances that the previous testifier didn't tell you that they should have to clarify. So we want to bring all the inmates home, make it clear, but we have to follow the classification system and we have to bring them back to the right facility that meets the classification level where they are. That's why we had our classification system reviewed. We're doing a pilot project now.

Okay, thank you.

Okay.

You're welcome.

Other questions before asking your second round of questions, Mr. Shimizu? Are there other questions for other members? Representative Cochran.

Thank you, and thank you, Director, for being here. So, I heard you say the classifications are being looked at and the people in Arizona are-- don't fit, I guess, the empty bed space that are here due to the, you know, minimum security. So are the ones in-- Arizona is a prison, so only prisons here are Kulani and Halawa that seem to have open bed space. The MCCC and Kauai, these facilities would not-- could not accommodate the Arizona prisoners?

No, because those are jails. So I want to make it clear. All our CCC's are jails and are designed to hold pretrial misdemeanors, pretrial felons, and those transitioning back off to work furlough. Once someone is sentenced by the court, they go from the jail to a prison.

So the jails are not set to hold felons long-term, only coming back through the work-criminal programs. So the only place we can actually put them is either Halawa, or if they qualify, Kulani or Halawa.

Okay.

Any further questions?

One quick one. I know back, many years ago, there was discussion about a puunene. I think that was a jail too, but--

That was to replace the Maui Community Correctional Center in the mid-2000s, right below the National Guard Armory on Maui. Price tag came in above $240 million, so at that time, Ted Sakai, the previous director, did not agree to seek funding for the-- because his ceiling was $240 million. I think Governor Cayetano at the time would not allow him to seek more money.

And this currently is no longer being entertained at this point?

No. There was some discussion about creating a regional criminal justice--for lack of a better term--facility where the courts would be Hawaii Paroling Authority, Department of Correction and Rehabilitation would be, but I think there's issue with water rights in Maui, and so I don't think that project went anywhere.

All right, thank you.

Any more questions?

No.

Chair Belatti, any questions on your side? You have a question? You have one more question, Mr. Shimizu?

Yeah. Director, you mentioned the study, the reclassification study. Was it done by Chaminade, you said?

It was done by Professor Janet Davidson at Chaminade. So she's done with the study. We're in the pilot now. We started to file it at the end of February.

Is that a report that we can get a copy of?

Yeah, we'll get you a copy of the final report, but-- that's the final report on the classification study, but the report on the pilot and the validity of the pilot won't be ready until the end of this year or the next year.

Yeah, I'll take what you got.

Okay. Fair enough.

If you would share that with me as chair, I can share it with the committee members. And I think it would be important, not just the report that was provided to you, but what is your timeline for moving forward in implementation? Because I think-- certainly, I'm very frustrated with how slowly things are moving.

And so I would like to get a very clear timeline from you because it seems to me that we are preventing people from moving to minimum security that should qualify to be able to move there. I understand you've told me that they don't, but I want to understand that it's taken this long for you to do your revisions of your reclassification system.

My colleague here runs the committee that's responsible for public safety, so I'm not going to venture too far into that, but it overlaps with what we do in this committee enough that I need to understand better why it's taking so long because I just don't think that that's justified. And I appreciate you think it's-- you're doing things properly and I just want to understand that better.

So please provide us with the report, but also your timeline for implementation because I think that there is a lot of interest in moving this bill forward, and so you're going to need to start looking at how to implement, not whether, and without building new facilities.

But the committee has to understand, whatever the committee law the committee passes, we will try our best to adhere to, but I want to make it clear: we do not control 95% of the population that comes to us.

I understand. I'm not asking for reasons why it won't work. I'm trying to figure out how we can make this work. And I think it's clear that there has been policies and procedures within the department that have prevented this from working. And not just laws--policies and procedures which you have control over.

And so I'm very concerned that this is taking way too long, and this committee, we'll see if they agree with me and we can move this bill forward. Personally, I think we need to see better performance from the department to rehabilitate people so you can live up to the other half of your name.

Thank you for your good work and I appreciate you working hard with your team to bring our people home because it's not happening. Thank you, sir. Any other questions, members? If not, let's move on to the next measure: House Bill 1628, House Draft 1, relating to compassionate release.

This measure establishes a protocol for compassionate release for certain ill or seriously debilitated incarcerated persons. First up, we have the Office of Hawaiian Affairs on Zoom.

Aloha, Chair, Vice Chair, and members of the committee. Hopefully my audio is better now.

Yes, it is. Thank you.

Okay, great. We are in strong support of this measure. This bill establishes a clear, fair, and timely compassionate release protocol for incarcerated persons who are terminally ill or seriously debilitated, including those whose medical needs cannot be adequately met in a correctional setting.

OHA appreciates the recent amendments requiring notice to the Prosecuting Attorney at least 48 hours before a compassionate release hearing, which strengthens safeguards and transparency. This measure is directly connected to Native Hawaiian well-being, as Native Hawaiians experience disproportionate and compounding harms across the criminal legal system.

OHA has consistently supported reforms that reduce unnecessary incarceration, strengthen re-entry, and promote culturally grounded pathways to restoration and healing. Compassionate release ensures that continued confinement does not become a default substitute for appropriate medical care when incarceration no longer meaningfully advances public safety.

Long-term incarceration carries intergenerational impacts, and for Native Hawaiian ohana already facing structural inequities, prolonged incarceration of a seriously ill family member can deepen trauma and instability. Hawaii is the only state without a comprehensive, compassionate release statute.

This bill creates defined medical criteria, time-bound review, and transparent reporting to promote consistency and accountability. Mahalo for the opportunity to testify. We respectfully urge the committee pass this measure.

Thank you very much. Mr. Johnson, Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation. Thank you for being here.

Good afternoon, Chair, Vice Chair, member of the committee. I'm Tommy Johnson, the director of Corrections and Rehabilitation. I'll just summarize my testimony on the five key points, the testimony.

We oppose this measure because it includes inmates who are serving life without the possibility of parole, without having the governor first commute their sentence, and HPA setting a minimum term for them. We oppose this measure because it includes people serving a mandatory minimum term imposed by the court.

We think that goes over-- does an end run around the Judiciary's authority to set mandatory minimum terms for crimes. We don't believe a fellow inmate should be allowed to apply for compassionate release for another person that's incarcerated. I see clear abuses that could occur.

This does not provide-- the bill does not provide the additional staff we would need to implement the measure and to deal with the increase in requests we're going to receive and this measure does not provide any mechanism or requirements for victim notification or surviving family members or victims to be notified if someone's being considered for release, whereas the current process does. And that's all I have. Subject to questions always.

Thank you very much for your testimony, sir. Next, we have Christin Johnson, Hawaii Correctional System Oversight Commission.

Aloha, Chair, Vice Chair, and members of the committee. My name is Christin Johnson, oversight coordinator of the Hawaii Correctional System Oversight Commission. You know, our commission has the authority to be able to go into any correctional facility in the state at any time, and we do that very often so that we can make sure that we have a deep understanding of what the incarcerated population is experiencing and also what staff are experiencing.

What we have personally witnessed is that there are suffering of elderly, seriously ill, and dying individuals who appear to no longer pose a threat to public safety, and so, we are in strong support of this measure. The other piece that I wanted to just highlight out of our testimony is that the State of Hawaii has to pay out of pocket for all medical costs for people in custody.

People in custody do not have insurance, and so the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation has a substantial cost, especially for these complex medical cases, which again, takes away from other expenses they could be spending that money on, especially when we know that our facilities desperately need the deferred maintenance that's occurred.

I also just want to note on the staff side that staff have reported to the commission pretty consistently that caring for critically ill and dying incarcerated individuals places heavy emotional, logistical, and also clinical burdens on already strained workforce.

We know that there is a serious lack of not just uniform correction staff, but also medical staff within our correctional facilities, and the department is trying very hard to fill those vacancies and we applaud them for those efforts, but that doesn't negate the fact that these types of cases take away from the general population, who then become a little forgotten about when staff have to focus so deeply on complex medical cases.

The last piece I just want to mention briefly is the department had mentioned incarcerated people applying for other incarcerated people. The reason why this is important for the commission is because many people don't realize that when you're incarcerated, the only other people sometimes who look out for you are other incarcerated individuals. And so when we're talking about people with really medically complex issues, they usually have an aide assigned to them. It's usually like an inmate worker.

And so in my mind, at least, that's who I kind of visualize. I visualize inmate workers who are spending day-in, day-out with these folks and know that they can't apply for themselves. I'm thinking about roommates or bunkies who see these folks day-in, day-out and know they can't apply for themselves. So I do think that's an important piece to keep in this measure, but thank you so much for the opportunity to testify.

Thank you very much. Next, the Hawaii Paroling Authority. Mr. DeMello.

Good afternoon, Chair, Vice Chair, members. My name is Corey Rinke. I'm the administrator of the Hawaii Paroling Authority. I'll just summarize our testimony and indicate that the HPA doesn't have the authority to override or grant commutations to the inmates who are sentenced to life with parole and we also don't have the authority to adjust the mandatory minimum, which comes from the Judiciary branch.

One of our other concerns about the bill is there's little to no mention about victims, because victims have their rights. In the past, people have felt that parole doesn't have any compassion for these inmates coming out on parole, but what I can tell you is that four were released under this compassion release last year in 2025. Almost immediately, all four of them engaged in illegal criminal behavior and illicit drug use, and their response was, because I just wanted to end my life faster.

So currently, there's already a policy that DCR has in place and we work closely with them for compassionate release cases. The issue has always been and will continue to be, no one will take them.

Myself and Bob Merce met with a hospital today, and as soon as I mentioned they'll be on parole, you can see their jaws drop. That stigma of someone being on parole, they're not looking at the person and what their medical conditions are. So that's always been our issue. I'm available if you have any questions.

Thank you. Appreciate it very much. Next, Pamela Ferguson-Brey, Crime Victim Compensation Commission.

Good afternoon. I'll stand here-- Pam Ferguson-Brey--

Everyone watching this on TV wants to see you. Just come on up to the podium. Take your time. It's okay. Go ahead and introduce yourself.

Good afternoon, Chair, Vice Chair, members. Pam Ferguson-Brey. I'm the executive director of the Crime Victim Compensation Commission. In that context, we serve on many different boards and work with other victim advocates to ensure that justice reform is informed by the needs of victims and community safety.

We oppose this bill because there is no notice to victims as is required. The issue about restitution and what happens when someone gets out and the need to collect restitution or requirement of collecting restitution is passed then to the victims.

And also, I think most-- of greatest concern is that there is no representative from the victim service community on the working group to develop the rules that is from the community that can speak to these issues. Being on a number of panels, I know you've appointed us to some of them.

People from the victim communities have been the only people who brought up the needs of notice and restitution, the right to be heard for crime victims. If there's not a victim service representative on this panel, there will be nobody speaking on behalf of victims and concerned about the needs-- their needs and the needs for community safety. So those are the reasons we oppose this.

Thank you very much. Next, Hayley Cheng, Office of the Public Defender.

Good afternoon, again. The Office of the Public Defender is strongly supportive of this measure. I would encourage every committee member, and in fact, every legislator who presides over bills related to incarceration, to take the opportunity to visit the facilities, specifically the medical units.

I believe that if you do so, you will see why this measure is so critically necessary. You are going to hear a lot of, I believe, emotional testimony from our community members, their family members, and those who have had to deal with this situation.

I want to frame the issue by saying that this only applies to a very, very small group of individuals who would need to qualify for consideration for compassionate release. This is not someone who has a broken arm or has pneumonia.

This is somebody who, as the bill says, is seriously ill, debilitated, or terminally ill, where they no longer pose a risk to public safety and whose needs far exceed the capacity of the correctional facilities. I also want to highlight legally that this bill is not a carte blanche--you apply, you get out, and you're free.

I think some of that is being lost in the discussion. The bill requires you to apply, and it sets the stage for that process to be expedited, because these people need an expedited process. It also grants the authority to reject applications for compassionate release if it is not deemed appropriate. They are also going to be on supervision.

It is not just a free release. It is, like Mr. Rinke said, parole for all intents and purposes. And finally, there is a revocation process, just like with parole, that if you violate, you will end up back in custody.

So I just want to frame that as well, that I don't want the message to be lost that it is just release without any accountability. It is release, and it is very much still you're under the thumb of the correctional system. Thank you, and we'll be available for questions.

Thank you very much. Department of Prosecuting Attorney, City and County of Honolulu. Hugo.

Good afternoon, Chair, Vice Chair, members of the committee. Daniel Hugo for the Honolulu Prosecutor's Office. We oppose this bill. I want to start by saying that the department does not oppose the principle of compassionate release, we don't oppose compassionate release in cases where the inmate has a terminal illness, and we appreciate the work of the House Committee on Public Safety and Military Affairs in improving this bill.

But our opposition is premised on two major weaknesses that we see in this bill. First, utterly inadequate victim input. Not simply notification, but input. This bill allows up to 15 business days between-- for the process to get started.

It allows 48 hours for notification to the Prosecuting Attorney. Victims are not an afterthought in the criminal justice system. They're not a footnote. Every victim of crime represents a promise that the Legislature made and that society broke.

And although the individual reactions to crime are going to be individual--some victims will forgive the criminal, some won't--both are valid, and victims deserve to have meaningful input into release decisions. We believe that that is very important, particularly when we are talking about life without parole. Life without parole means murder, and murder under special circumstances.

That means that this person has been convicted of taking something that is completely irrevocable and that they can never replace. And the victims who have to live with that loss every single day deserve an opportunity to provide meaningful input. The second weakness of this bill is that we believe that the language is still too broad.

I look here to page 5 at line 14, where it talks about--14 and 15--where it talks about someone who is too ill or cognitively impaired to participate in rehabilitation or to be aware of punishment.

That language would allow somebody to claim, for example, that they have antisocial personality disorder, ie: they are a sociopath, and that as a result, they are not able to meaningfully participate in rehabilitation.

We see these sort of frivolous requests that come in on the federal side, and we would not-- and although there are provisions in here for dealing with frivolous requests, believe that the statutory language still makes it too broad so that those requests cannot, on their face, be dismissed as frivolous.

We would also say that when we are talking about the most serious classes of criminals, people who-- someone who rapes a child, someone who kills for sport, these are people who will not hesitate to manipulate any-- to manipulate compassion in order to obtain personal advantage. Finally, I will say that I have been to Halawa as a prosecutor. It's a terrible place, and I've always been glad to leave.

I've also been to the graves of people who have been murdered, and I know which one is far more permanent and which one this committee cannot ever replace. Thank you.

Thank you. Josh Frost.

Good afternoon, again, Chair, Vice Chair, committee members. Josh Frost, ACLU of Hawaii. We support this bill. You've heard from a lot of folks who also support and we agree with them. I wanted to highlight a couple things. That Hawaii is the only state that doesn't have compassionate release statutes is troubling to us.

Also, in 2022, Families Against Mandatory Minimums, which is a nationwide organization, did a study of compassionate release processes across the country and that includes all 50 states and D.C. Surprising or not, Hawaii received an F grade due in part to the state's policy and inconsistent rules and lack of clarity. This bill would help remedy that.

I also wanted to note that, you know, we understand that the folks, you know, who have been sentenced to life, you know, that that can be a complicated question. The bill lays out a process. It is not irrevocable, it is not necessarily permanent, and also, you know, quite frankly, when it comes down to allocation of financial resources, we believe spending money on these handful of folks that those funds can be better allocated elsewhere within DCR. So for all those reasons, we support. Mahalo.

Thank you very much. Next, Lynn Costales Matsuoka.

Good afternoon, Chair, Vice Chair, and members of the committee. I appreciate the time. I'll be very quick. I am going to rest on our testimony and I just want to say, you know, that it's been incredible to hear everyone testify on this bill. Everyone is very passionate about this issue. And for SATC, it really is about victim engagement.

That's the Sex Abuse Treatment Center--

Sorry. Yes.

--for everyone who didn't know.

For the Sex Abuse Treatment Center, it really is about victim engagement and having them be a part of the process, and so, as this committee is looking at this particular bill, we would ask that there be some consideration for victims to have input, meaningful input in the process, and to build a process that really takes everyone into consideration before decisions are made as to whether compassionate release should be granted or not. Compassion works both ways.

There are two sides to this point, not just the offender or the convicted or incarcerated individual, but also that victim. And so for that reason, we stand on our testimony and we ask for your consideration as you're looking at this bill. Thank you.

Thank you very much. Next, Reverend Deborah Bond-Upson. Not present. Next, Shelby Billionaire.

Aloha, guys. Pikachu Shelby Billionaire, back. Thank you for being patient to go for this bill. I do support this bill one hundred percent because we have to have compassion for the people.

And if you guys know the numbers, when they're on that Death Row, Terminal 4, you're spending more money trying to taking care of them legally by following the law, millions of dollars, and there's rapes, all kind of stuff, and if they're going to mock it anyway, you must have some kind of passion.

But you should pass this bill with technical amendments for clarity and consistency because, you know, some people might try to find those loopholes to get out. So I agree with some of them, but I also think you should pass this bill and move it along so we can have some compassion just like the other bill previously. So thank you very much. Aloha.

Thank you. Next, Molly Crane on Zoom. Please proceed.

Hi, everyone. Thank you all so much for the opportunity to testify. It's so good to see many of you again. For those of you who don't know me, my name is Molly Crane, and I'm an attorney at FAMM. We are a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization and we've worked on compassionate release for 25 years all across the country.

We're grateful to have collaborated really closely with the agencies, staff members, nonprofits, and community members in creating this bill, and we strongly support the measure.

Compassionate release is best practice and exists in the federal system and every state but one because lawmakers recognize that people who are critically ill are the most expensive to incarcerate, the most burdensome to care for, and the least likely to recidivate.

Just to sort of underscore the cost piece here, the cost to care for people with critical illnesses in Hawaii is six to eight times higher the baseline, which is $100,000 per year.

This means that it costs a million dollars or more per person per year and Hawaii taxpayers are responsible for 100% of that amount. When people are released and on Medicaid, the federal government pays 73% of those costs. So it's a big saving for the state.

We've repeatedly heard today about the need to make space at Halawa and the strain on staff. I just want to highlight one individual who submitted testimony in the PDF hearing. Her name is Yvette. She's a former nurse in DCR.

She described how a physician at Halawa frequently delayed his own care while attempting to meet the growing demands of medically-complex patients, and he recently died. So I just want to honor his life and everything that he gave.

From the national perspective, Hawaii is the only state in the country whose compassionate release program is not governed by statute. This bill does align with best practices and can make Hawaii a leader in compassionate release. There's just a few things I'd like to highlight. You can read much more in my testimony, but the first is eligibility criteria.

It is best practice around the country for this criteria to focus on medical factors and to allow for individualized determinations rather than categorical exclusions. Here in this bill, the medical criteria match appropriate diagnostic standards. This bill also allows for careful consideration of a person's individualized risk to public safety.

Programs fail to achieve their cost and burden-shifting purpose when they categorically restrict using non-medical criteria. People serving mandatory minimums and/or life without parole are eligible for compassionate release in the majority of parole-based states. There is no state in the country that excludes people simply because they're serving a mandatory minimum sentence.

And this is true geographically across the political spectrum because we all recognize that no matter the sentence or conviction, people are burdensome and costly to care for and unlikely to recidivate. The second is timeliness. We know that people are rapidly deteriorating when they're very sick, and so it's important to act quickly.

I want to honor the amendments that we worked with Rep. Belatti to accomplish based on the feedback that we heard in her hearing. I want to make sure that everyone who is testifying today was able to read the amendments because we do provide for victim notification and that that time frame is based on the testimony of DCR, that they have made an agreement with the Hawaii Paroling Authority and with the Prosecutor's Office that that timeline is 48 hours.

That's the existing practice. That's not something that we created that came from DCR's testimony. Many states across the country don't have a provision for victim notification in the bill, and others are very brief, so this does align with the sort of unique urgency of compassionate release and the trends across the country.

May I ask you to summarize, please?

Yes, absolutely. Just briefly, I'll say, you know, we've worked on federal compassionate release since its inception and never has it been trimmed down because of frivolous requests. So the concern that this would be sort of an explosion of requests doesn't match the federal practice as cited.

I've been in Halawa myself and I've seen the harms of not having this bill, and so I would very much urge you to pass it, which would reduce costs, support staff, provide dignity, and protect public safety. Thank you, and I'll be here for questions.

Thank you very much, Ms. Crane. Next, Kat Brady, Community Alliance on Prisons.

Aloha, again. Kat Brady, testifying for CAP in strong support of this measure. I have been a caregiver to people who were facing end of life. They both died. It is excruciating to actually witness that.

So it's upsetting to hear that, as Ms. Crane just testified, that because somebody has a mandatory minimum, they would be excluded from this bill. That is what I would call the slow death penalty. Hawaii hasn't had a death penalty since 1959, and to sentence somebody to that, it's just horrible.

I know that there's people in the medical unit who have no idea who they are, where they are, and some of them even think, oh, my son's gonna come and pick me up. So, I mean, that person is obviously not amenable to rehabilitation; can't even figure out, you know, what to do.

So I really want to impress upon the committee how excruciating it is to see somebody die. And you have a burdensome request to pass a bill to be really compassionate, and that's one thing I love about this committee because the committee is full of people who have compassion. So thank you.

I think the-- getting to the monetary thing, the cost to treat people who are in that stage is ridiculous. One man in one quarter, it cost the state a million dollars, and then another person who needed some medication, $900,000. That ate up the medication budget.

I started getting calls from families who were really concerned because their loved ones couldn't access medication. So let's think about the people and humanity and what is the right thing to do, and I hope none of you ever have to witness somebody die. Thank you.

Thank you very much. Nikos Leverins.

Aloha, Chair, Vice Chair, and members. Nikos Leverenz with Hawaii Health and Harm Reduction Center. We strongly support this measure.

Our agency has long supported the implementation of a mechanism where the state's correctional authorities are able to reassign prisoners who require a high level of complex and costly medical care into community-based settings that are more conducive to their ongoing medical treatment.

Compassionate release, as has been mentioned, also reduces the larger fiscal burden of providing medical care to prisoners who are terminally ill, suffering from debilitating chronic or reversible conditions. We also support the data collection and public reporting requirements to ensure that DCR is implementing the policy adequately.

The short of it is is that the current policy is a failure and that the fact that we do not have a compassion statute, compassionate release statute on the books, is in utter aberration. So mahalo for hearing this bill and mahalo for the opportunity to provide testimony.

Thank you, sir. Next, Lou Erteschik on Zoom.

Thank you. Yes, good afternoon, Representative Tarnas. I'm Louie Erteschik, director of Disability Rights Center, and-- oops. It looks like I'm losing my connection here.

I hear you. Go ahead.

Okay, you can hear me. It looks like I just lost the video for some reason. We've been advocating for this for a long time, both as a policy issue and on individual cases as well. Okay, now I can see you. I've worked on some of these cases. I've worked with Bob Merce, who does a lot of them. The problem with the current system is that it's just very ad hoc.

You got guys like Bob Merce who take an interest and they bring a case. The beauty of this bill is that it formalizes the process, so it creates an entire structure, and I think that's probably the main value of it.

I'm glad that others have picked up on what I first raised at the Subject Matter Committee, which is that even if you were not-- if you were not concerned about the humanitarian issues--and I know that you are--even if you're just a number cruncher, this bill was sort of a no-brainer.

These are the most expensive prisoners you're ever going to find anywhere and Medicaid does not cover the cost of care in the prison. So by transitioning into the community, you totally alleviate the cost. So just a couple of other observations.

Listening to-- reading and listening to the testimony of some of the people who were expressing opposition, I think their concerns can actually be addressed to bring people to a point of where maybe we could get some agreement.

I can't speak for the other colleagues of mine who support the bill, but the idea, for example, of victim notification, I mean, I don't think that's an unreasonable idea, personally. I think the point that people have made about that certainly rings true to me. So I think that's one thing.

This issue of the mandatory minimum, you know, I don't know what the answer is. I don't know-- if somebody is serving a life sentence without parole, are they eligible, are they not? But let's find out. Let's ask the Attorney General for an opinion. I mean, if they can't do it, then you can't do it. If you can do it, then I think that's fine.

As far as the cost that Director Johnson was talking about, a couple 100,000 dollars for somebody to implement this program is going to be chump change compared to the amount of money he's going to save if they actually transition these people out of the facility into the community.

And just the final-- the final point I was going to make is that the problem is bigger than just this, and this bill alone is not going to totally solve the problem because, I think as the gentleman from the Paroling Authority pointed out, it's not easy to place these people in the community.

If they're going home, that's one thing, but the problem that Bob Merce and I ran into with a couple of cases is there's a stigma among care homes, care home operators. They don't like taking people who are prisoners, and the way our system in Hawaii is set up, they can kind of cherry pick who they take and who they don't take.

And so for the same amount of money that Medicaid is going to pay them, would they rather have some quiet little old lady who's just going to sit there and watch television or would they rather take some guy who's just coming out of Halawa after serving a 30-year sentence for murder?

So you're going to have a hard time placing these people in the community unless you address that, but I do think this bill is very important and I just wanted to share my observations with the committee. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Erteschik. Next, Bob Merce.

Thank you, Chair Tarnas, Vice Chair Poepoe. I'm glad to see Representative Belatti here, too, today. And we're glad that the bill arrived at this venue in essentially the same condition with a lot of improvements that were made because we spent a lot of time working on this bill and developing it.

I was part of the Kalana Ola Coalition. It's a group of people who were concerned about welfare of our community and are all involved in criminal legal justice issues, mostly lawyers who have experience in the criminal system. And we worked on this bill.

We started in January, and we had the help of some of the best experts in the country from FAMM, including Molly Crane, and some of her colleagues were even more experienced than just she is. And we looked at all 50 states to see what best practices are, what is working.

We looked at all of the bills that have been passed or been introduced in Hawaii in the last four years, and we tried to bring best practices into Hawaii, and we looked at every statute that we could find and took what seemed to work.

We also sat down with the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation and with the Paroling Authority and spent over, I remember, at least six hours where we went over every single sentence and every single word of the bill that was introduced in the House.

And as far as I can recall, we reached agreement on nearly everything except one thing, and that was the life without parole. And so I want to encourage you to just think twice before you make changes to this bill because it really, I think, does incorporate best practices across the country, and that's what we certainly want for Hawaii.

And with regard to life without parole, I think one of the most important things we have to remember is that we have somebody in prison, for example, right now in Arizona who is 84 years old. He's been in prison for 57 years. He was convicted of murder and he was sentenced to life without parole.

In the 1990s, I was asked to help him. And the first thing I did was I googled his name to see what his offense was, and I found that he was convicted of a fight where a police officer died and that resulted in a first degree murder conviction.

He was sentenced, and in 1990, the first thing I found on the Internet when I looked at it was he received a commendation from the department in the 1990s because there was a big fight and there were visitors at the prison there in Eloy, Saguaro, and he was part of...

He organized a group to surround and take care of the visitors who were there, who were in danger. And he got them out of that situation. And he received a commendation from Keith Kaneshiro for his bravery and for his contribution to saving these people.

He has obviously changed his life in the years that he has been in prison. There's no reason to believe that he is a terrible person or a danger and he's still in good health. But I've been talking with his granddaughter who wants me to help get him out, maybe through the Governor.

He's not sick now, but if he does become ill, we need to be able to say to this man, we understand you've changed. We understand that we have to have mercy. It's part of our system of justice too. And if he becomes ill, he is the kind of person who should be granted compassion or release, notwithstanding the fact that he's serving life without parole. And the final point is we have a case in Hawaii called Slingluff versus State of Hawaii.

It holds that when we decide to incarcerate somebody and they become sick, they are entitled to the same level of medical care as they would get on the outside. And we cannot provide that at this point in time. I don't know if any of you have been to the infirmary at Halawa. That is our main medical facility.

It is an infirmary. It is not a hospital, it is not a clinic. It is not a long term care facility. It is not a skilled nursing facility. It is the lowest level. And it is not an infirmary, as you may think of it. It is simply a group of cells in a daycare in a day room. There's two men to a cell.

And there's nothing in the cell except for the beds, a little table beside it for their food, and a steel toilet and a tiny little window at the top. There's no fresh air. There's no sunlight, there's no... It's a terrible situation. And we are every day in violation of Slingluff because we cannot and do not provide the standard of care in our correctional system that people receive in the community.

And so until we can change that, we should not be in a position where we are forcing the department to take care of people who they admit they cannot take care of. And that is why we have a provision in this bill that says that we can release these people. At least consider them for release if we can't take care of them. Thank you very much.

Thank you very much, Mr. Merce. Carrie Ann Shirota.

Aloha, Chair, Vice Chair, Committee Members. Carrie Ann Shirota, community member, attorney. I also have had the privilege of working as the Director of Maui Economic Opportunities Reintegration Program some years ago where we serve individuals who are convicted of Class A and Class B felonies, felonies that are considered the most serious and violent.

And I'm here to attest to you and tell you that that people are capable of rehabilitation and transformation. I support this bill for medical, humanitarian, and fiscal reasons. So many things that have been echoed already today. But I want to highlight and sort of rebut, I think, some of the department's concerns.

One, I think we're all I heard from the Department and Hawaii Paroling Authority that they support this measure, but they have concerns about eligibility for the most part. So I think that there's still some common ground here.

But addressing to exclude categorically those who are sentenced to life without the possibility of parole, it is not a best practice, as we've heard from the experts at the national level. We also are assuming that every person who is inside of our jails and prison is actually guilty.

And as you know through many hearings yourself, we know of people who have been wrongfully convicted. We know of someone named Alvin Jardine who is in the graveyard right now because he was wrongfully convicted. He grew up not very far from where I grew up in Haiku, Maui.

And his family had him sent away all over the different private prison tours. And he was convicted of a violent crime, a rape that he never committed. And he was separated from his child at six months old and he died with no compensation.

So we should not be assumed, first of all, that every person who's inside is guilty of the crime. But even if someone is guilty of the crime, we need to look to our values we have codified in our statute, Aloha Spirit.

We talk about the values of Kuleana and Mālama, and we should be thinking about those who are vulnerable from Keiki to Kupuna, to people who are terminally ill, to people who have no cognitive awareness that if you were to ask them why they're inside Halawa, well I'm waiting because my son's going to pick me up.

Clearly Alzheimer's, no consciousness of where they're at. These are the types of individuals that we are speaking of, people who have chronic debilitating conditions who are suffering.

And so if we are talking about mission alignment and we've changed from the Department of Public Safety to Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, we need to align with that and believe that people are capable of rehabilitation. Otherwise we might have to convert it to Department of Suffering and Damnation.

There are two legal arguments that have been raised or implied in testimony from the different state agencies. One, which is that by allowing individuals who have life without the possibility of parole, that it infringes upon the Governor's clemency powers. There has been no case law, no statute, whether in Hawaii, other states, or nationally to support that.

And I'm here to say that that is not a valid legal argument. And even though I'm not privy to it, my understanding is that the Department of Attorney General provide an opinion to Christin Johnson from the Oversight Commission and that she shared it with both the Department of Corrections as well as Hawaii Paroling Authority.

And so the fact that this argument, this legal argument continues to be raised is quite troubling. And the AGs has not weighed in on this. The other legal argument that's raised is that it's somehow infringing upon judicial powers. The Judiciary is not here to testify in opposition to the measure.

In addition to that, it is within the purview of lawmakers to pass laws. It is your purview as it has been for past legislative bodies to pass mandatory minimums, LWOP. But that can also be reversed.

So you have made a decision or the past committee has passed this award recognizing that all individuals who meet the criteria for eligibility, which is based upon medical opinions and determinations, not laypersons, not myself, the advocate, medical professionals.

And we've also heard in past meetings that if a person meets this criteria, the Paroling Authority has the ability to determine if they believe they're a safety threat, not to grant compassionate release. So that safety valve exists.

May I ask you to summarize please?

I think I just want to last comment upon. I think the way that we sort of default to terminology of offenders and victims, and I think that we need to start moving away from that terminology. Even people who have committed wrongs are not the worst thing that they've ever committed.

And many people who are in our jails and prisons have been victims and survivors and they haven't been supported, particularly under resourced communities, especially falling upon Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islanders. And for myself, when I hear other people default to tough on crime rhetoric, it is personally makes me shake because I know what it's like.

I have had a loved one, an uncle when I was six who was murdered on Maui. I also am a survivor of sexual assault. And so for other people to invoke victims and survivor rights, there is a spectrum. But I can tell you that my family's faith traditions is that we believe in compassion, we believe in forgiveness.

Not everyone is at that place, but we should not invoke that as a, that overall it reaches everyone. And last, there is a victim notification codified in HD 1, which was not included in the first draft. And that is the practice that's already in place. So we can address getting more people into the community.

That's a separate issue that needs to be addressed, as Corey has mentioned and Hawaii Disability Rights Center. But for today, please pass this measure. We need a streamlined system, especially with our jails and prisons in the state of disrepair. Thank you.

Thank you very much. Dennis Dunn on Zoom. Please proceed, Mr. Dunn.

Thank you. I'm Dennis Dunn, testifying on opposition to this measure as is currently drafted. I am not unsympathetic to the concept of compassionate release. In fact, I think in many situations it's appropriate. Unfortunately, the current measure as drafted does not make adequate accommodations for the concerns of victims.

In particular, there is no consultation with victims in regard to the release. I'm not talking about the question of whether or not to release, but in particular the conditions under which someone is released and where they will be released. Victim consultation to that I think is required and important.

Secondly, although there is some added provisions regarding the notification to victims, the current provisions are not adequate. There has to be adequate notification that will allow victims to adequately prepare and to be able to accommodate their situation to the circumstances of the offender's release. And so the main issue, I'm just saying meaningful engagement by victims is required for this to be workable.

And with that, I'll just let you know that I'm not unsympathetic in part. I've spent some time in correctional facilities in my youth, and I know it's not a great place to be, and I know there are people who are there who are not having their medical needs met. So I'm not opposed to release. I just think victims need to be included in the process. Thank you.

Thank you very much. Maysana Aldeguer. Aldeguer.

Good afternoon, Chair, Vice Chair, and Members of the Committee. My name is Maysana Aldeguer. I'm a former correctional officer that was assigned to and of a female who was dying of AIDS. And my job was to have her shackled to the bedpost knowing she was brain dead.

And I believe in this compassion release bill because that's cruel, and cruel punishment for those who doesn't have the facility. The facility is not equipped to be a nursing home or even allowing them to have hospice. There's no access to nutrition in there.

I'd like to invite you to go have some lunch over there one day at the facility and just enjoy your meal. I think the problem is between the Judiciary and the Parole Board, because if the judge sentenced the inmate to a certain amount of time, the Parole Board has the power to override it and give him more.

Also, I'd like to share about life without the possibility of parole. I stand with them because some of them are misjudged or was missentenced and in correction, the capital punishment was ended in 1957, and Hawaii became a state in 1959. And life without the possibility of parole is a death sentence.

It's death by incarceration. In 1959, we became a state. And so far, Hawaii has never gave the death penalty to anyone. So I encourage you to keep that record going to keep us free from the death sentence. Thank you.

Thank you very much. Nelson Sua.

Good afternoon, Chairman, Vice Chairman, and Committee Members. My name is Nelson Sua. You know, I support this bill. You know, I feel that, you know, with compassion, compassion is grace, you know. And my faith has taught me that, you know, it's always good to extend it. And I heard the gentleman said about the, they stated about the four that was released. And that's not for everybody. Not everybody will break the rules.

And I only know that because in my own siblings, my brother was the reason why the murder age dropped to 15, you know, and some of my brothers have committed crimes like murder. Now they have served their time and they're out. And you know what? They've never got in trouble ever since. And they've been productive.

They've come alongside with me, along with my cousin, and we actually go into the schools and into communities and churches and share this story. Because we can never rewind time, but we can share our stories because one day these kids will become parents, become leaders in their own home.

And so I do understand both sides of what is stated today, but, you know, we gotta extend grace. And I believe from what I'm hearing today, for those that support this bill, it's on the right track. And I just pray that everything works out in the end and that people can get reunited with their families, those that are at the tail end of their life. So I just wanted to share that. Thank you.

Thank you very much. Eddyn Stanley.

Hello. My name is Eddyn Stanley, and I'm here with my brothers and sisters, along with my family. But I like to speak upon my dad's case because my dad got life without parole. He was wrongfully charged. Yeah. But we support this bill. Yeah. So he was wrongfully charged. And since we don't have the death penalty over here.

We'd like to have my dad back home. You know, I was a little girl, 7 years old, still crying for my dad, knowing that my dad never ever gonna come home. You know, and the sound of that little girl crying is it's weird. You know what I mean? It's weird.

Try having your daughter cry out, you know, for their father. But not only for my dad, but the rest of the people in life without parole. I just asking you guys to pass it, but please look at the lifers, you know, the people with life without parole.

Because I believe they don't, they don't deserve for dying there because of our... Because we don't have a death penalty here, you know. I pray my dad come home one day, you know, but that's all I gotta say. Thank you.

Thank you very much for testifying. Saralyn Lopes. Yes, please.

And my dad's case was he got charged for attempted murder, and nobody got hurt. So yes, he was wrongfully charged. I just ask you guys to take a look at my dad's case. His name is Edward Stanley, and that's all I gotta say. Thank you.

Thank you very much. I appreciate you testifying. Saralyn. Saralyn Lopes.

Aloha, everyone. I also support this bill, HB 1628. I believe people do change because I also had committed some hideous crime back in my days, but now I reside as a clean and sober house person. I've been clean and sober for a hot minute. We do recover, you know, we do change. Try not to let our past define us today. You know, but please support the compassionate release to the prison. Please. Thank you.

Thank you very much for testifying. Roselyn Tao. Not present. Eda G. Stanley. And then Edine Stanley afterward.

Can we just do it one time?

You can do it together. Support each other.

Yes. Hi, my name is Edine Stanley. I support this bill. I have a dad that's in Arizona. He's been in there almost 40 years. He also have... He's 68 years old. He has kidney failure, he has heart failure, he has diabetes. He has all of that. This is why we stand here for our compassionate bill. Right?

My dad is a life without parole. He did not kill anyone. And yeah, that's what I'm saying. So we just, we stand in agreement that, you know, maybe you guys stand in agreement with us and pass this bill for not just my dad, but, you know, others too as well. Thank you.

Mahalo to whole Stanley ohana. Thank you. JoAnne Keaulana. JoAnne Keaulana. Is JoAnne outside?

Yeah, I'll get her.

And Pikake Quebatay.

Hi. Aloha. My name is Pikake Quebatay. I work for MOKA. I'm the woman's program manager. Mostly I had this whole thing written up. Mostly what a lot of people said is really what I agree with. I am for this bill to be passed. And basically I am a convicted felon as well.

During my time that I served in Women's Prison and at OCCC, there were women that were sick and we took care of them. Just listening to all the people talk about all the money. I mean, we should have got paid some of that because seriously. And it was no joke. I was trying to do my time.

I was trying to figure out what was going on in my life. And I had to take care of this individual because the door is locked and the people is not listening. The ACO is not listening. They don't have any workers. The same person is working overtime. And so I get it. Right.

We have to just deal with it. I had to just deal with it. And it still traumatizes me today. So it doesn't just affect the families and the people that are there, but it also affects the people that are around in that environment. This is a mental health issue that will spread throughout the community. So by passing this bill, it's going to allow families to be together.

I mean, this is really a no brainer, like they were saying. You know, it's really love over fear. Yeah, I get it. There's definitely going to have to be rules and things in place, and I'm sure all of that will come, right. If you build it, it'll come. Another important thing I heard was housing. So I am the woman's manager for the clean and sober housing for Makana O Ke Akua.

And we would be more than willing to help with this compassionate housing to house women. You know, so like, and I'm sure that the other community members that I work with and the other clean and sober homes would be more than willing, you know, to help with that. There's other resources, it's not just hospitals.

And I understand that the people that we are dealing with are prisoners and understand there needs to be certain things in place and certain people, you know, nurses and all of that. But we are a community, we can make it happen. So please vote the bill in, and thank you for letting me share.

Thank you very much for your testimony. JoAnne Keaulana, one more time. Okay. Anyone else wishing to testify in this measure?

Aloha. Angela Melody Young, CARES, in strong favor of this bill. So I'm proposing an amendment to work with DHS SNAP program and the DHS and the QUEST Integration for food stamp benefits and a comprehensive health insurance coverage plan as they are to be released compassionately from prison and to ensure better services to be provided to accommodate those who are eligible as candidates for compassionate release.

Perhaps consider in the work group to work with DHS. So also I don't know what office would be needed to provide language to come up with language to define what is eligible for health conditions to qualify for compassionate release, to describe inmates with significant disabilities, such as histories of trauma, prior childhood trauma, to have a better understanding of their chronic conditions.

And then to also, like, describe the mental health conditions such as PTSD, anxiety, those that are at higher suicide risk, that would not be appropriate to be kept in a facility. So if the work group can consider language to address those conditions, physical health conditions, such as degenerative disc or chronic painful conditions such as TMJ, temporomandibular joint disorders, that they would not do well in prisons for a long period of time. And also...

Could you summarize, please?

Yes. I don't know if the appropriate department to help is Corrections or the Paroling Authority or perhaps the Office of Wellness and Resiliency from the Governor's Office to perform an assessment if the inmates are in good shape or not. So you know, I have two special needs persons. The verbal one got the nonverbal one to look at porn and now the nonverbal one is in jail and like this...

Thank you very much. JoAnne Keaulana. Thanks for coming back. I appreciate you being here. Please proceed.

Okay. Aloha, Chair and Members of the Committee. Thank you for the opportunity to testify today in strong support of HB 1628 before the state Hawaii state legislature. I'm here today not as an expert, but as someone who has lived inside the system. To my understanding, Hawaii does not have, does not currently have a clear and meaningful pathway for compassionate release.

That fully considers serious medical conditions, aging, and long term rehabilitation. HB 1628 begins to address that gap, not by removing accountability, but by allowing compassion to exist alongside justice. I was incarcerated for a long period of time. I accepted responsibility for my actions.

I was accountable and I was willing to do my time. But what no one should ever have to endure is the lack of compassion during serious medical care. While I was incarcerated, I underwent surgery. I was handcuffed throughout the entire procedure. Afterward I was... Afterwards I was. I returned to the infirmary with very little assistance or support.

What should have been a three week recovery turned into more than over a month of unnecessary pain and suffering due to the inadequate care. Doing time is one thing. Suffering beyond that simply because you're incarcerated feels like double jeopardy. This is why I support the compassionate release.

When someone is medically fragile, recovering from surgery, elderly, or seriously ill, the prison environment is not designed to promote healing or dignity. In those moments, we must ask ourselves what purpose is truly being served by keeping them there.

We already allow individuals who are still going through the court process who are considered far less vulnerable to be released on supervised programs, including house arrests with ankle monitoring.

So I respectfully ask, if we trust supervision, monitoring, and strict conditions for individuals who are stronger and more capable, why would we not extend the same or greater consideration to someone who is physically weaker, medically compromised, and poses far less risk? HB 1628 does not open the doors without safeguards.

It allows for careful review, strict stipulations, supervised release, and accountability, while also allowing families to step in and provide care that the prison system simply cannot. Why not allow someone in that condition to return home under supervision so their family can care for them with dignity, compassion, and love?

I support HB 1628 because I have experienced what happens when compassion is absent. I support it because justice should never require unnecessary suffering. And I support it because Hawaii has the opportunity to lead with both wisdom and mercy. So as a person of faith, I believe that justice and compassion are not opposites.

They are meant to walk together. Scripture reminds us that mercy does not weaken justice, it completes it. We are called to remember the sick, the imprisoned, and the suffering and to respond with wisdom, dignity, and love. HB 201628 reflects those values. It recognizes accountability while also honoring the possibility of redemption and healing.

I respectfully ask you continue to consider not only the law, but the humanity behind it and the lives that can be restored through the compassion guided by careful judgment. Mahalo for your time, service, and your willingness to consider this bill with both wisdom and heart.

Thank you very much for your testimony, Ms. Keaulana. Anyone else wishing to testify in this measure? Please come on up and provide testimony. If you could let us know your name.

My name is Roselyn Tao. And I just want to say thank you, Chairman, all Senators, and Committee, to having me here. So I support this compassion release because my brother who is a lifer in Arizona for 40 years and he has some health issues.

And we want to bring him home, you know, want to bring him home because all those years he hasn't been with family. He's a brother, a father, a grandparent, grandfather, and great grandfather, and we want to bring him home. So I support this bill, and I appreciate it for being here. Thank you so much.

Thank you very much. Anyone else wishing to testify in this measure? Sir, you want to introduce yourself?

My name Danny Tupuola. I did over 40 years in prison. I'm a lifer with parole. The brothers that, they're struggling in there, I feel that. I mean I just like to say that it costs a lot just to have medical issues inside their medical part. I mean taking care of them. I mean we Hawaii, you know, we should have more law for guys that did a lot of time because they all in their senior years and we don't know how long they will be.

But I can say that guys like me like them when they come out majority of the time the percentage of them making it the outside way than the other kind of guys. But I thank you guys so much for your support and let's start to say my peace. God bless you guys.

Thank you very much. If you could do me a favor and provide your name if you haven't already done so. No, no worries, no worries. Just anyone else wishing to testify in this measure? If not, questions, Members? Okay. Representative Shimizu.

Hawaii Paroling Authority. In your amendment, your testimony, you said that you had concerns because you don't have authority to fix or reduce minimum terms. So is that correct?