Steve Alm, Prosecuting Attorney for the City and County of Honolulu
The prosecutor’s office will conduct investigations into recent police shootings in which a 29-year-old man and a 16-year-old boy were killed, Alm said last week.
Three separate teams from his office will independently look at both cases, he said Tuesday.
Previously, the Honolulu Police Department investigated all shootings by officers and sent findings to prosecutors, a process that could take more than a year, Alm said.
“There s no question the Honolulu Police Department has many investigators that can investigate all of these crimes. I have no reason to doubt they didn t do a good job in the last 20 years of investigating those,” Alm told the Conversation.
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April 30, 2021
This week makes nearly four years since the Hawaii Legislature decided that it was important to have independent investigations of officer-involved deaths. Act 161, as it is now known, passed unanimously and was signed into law by Gov. David Ige.
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The purpose of the act, as lawmakers explained in a committee report that year, was to promote law enforcement transparency and accountability by establishing a Law Enforcement Officer Independent Review Board within the Department of the Attorney General.
The board, which also received funding, would make recommendations to county prosecuting attorneys, who would then decide whether to prosecute or conduct further investigation. Their findings would eventually be made public, too.
Honolulu Prosecutor Promises Independent Investigations Into Police Shootings - Honolulu Civil Beat
But it’s unclear whether the public will ever see the results of his office’s investigation. Reading time: 6 minutes.
Honolulu Prosecuting Attorney Steve Alm said on Thursday that his office will conduct independent investigations into two recent fatal shootings by Honolulu police officers and will approach the review process differently than his predecessors.
“This is a new administration, and we are looking at all the practices and procedures, and we are going to do things differently,” Alm said at a press conference. “I believe it is critical to have an independent but thorough, objective investigation into both of these cases and for any future police-involved shooting of civilians.”