Chief Ben Moskowitz
Appearances
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Probable Cause | Chapter 8
wouldn't it have been much easier to call us and ask us or to call me if they didn't trust the investigators or to call the mayor or to call the prosecutor or, I mean, there's gotta be some level of at least try the right way to collaborate. In Hawaii, collaboration is a huge thing. I've lived on the mainland, I've lived all over the world. It's just, it's different here.
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Probable Cause | Chapter 8
The way that people treat each other typically and the way that groups, even that groups that may disagree strongly on things, work together here is incredible. And there was, doesn't seem to be any of that. For them to have called around to the morgue, well, first of all, the... Again, the coroner happens to be the police chief.
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Probable Cause | Chapter 8
So he didn't talk to the coroner or the medical examiner because he didn't. I mean, he may have called the morgue where the bodies are kept and talked to somebody who confirmed something they may or may not have should have been able to. how much easier would it have been to pick up the phone and call or send an email?
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Probable Cause | Chapter 8
And if we don't get back to him or we say, Pound Sam, we're not going to tell you, then all right. But why not try to see if the front door is unlocked before you try to find a window to sneak through on the backside?
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Probable Cause | Chapter 8
I mean, stuff like that makes it difficult to continue to try to foster a collaborative relationship when then that turns into bombs being hurled through filings that the police department intended. We knew we wanted him to kill himself.
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Probable Cause | Chapter 8
There is a certain member of the Hawaii Innocence Project who's been very vocal in the media the last 48 hours, who said some really mean and nasty things about the police department and what our intentions were. And like we've always said, anything that we can share or that has been shared that is out there that we can now comment on, we're more than willing to do that.
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Probable Cause | Chapter 8
We're happy to put that extra set of eyes, or in your case, extra set of ears, on the case that could give us a perspective we hadn't considered or could lead to something that, you know, essentially, regardless of what the resource is, we want to get to the end of that trail and find out where the facts lead so we can get some sort of, not only justice for the Ireland's, but closure for the community here.
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Probable Cause | Chapter 8
If you had told me a month ago that this is where this path would have turned, I would have called you a liar and said there's no possible way. But it's impossible to even give you a timeline when we guarantee that they'll still be all wrapped up and we'll have all the answers because we don't know where the path goes, right? But what that information is and where it's going to go,
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Probable Cause | Chapter 8
As the chief, I can't tell you that. The people who are actively working on this investigation every day are the people with all those details, the people who know the level of stuff that you know. I could talk to you about HR and hiring practices and my budget.
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Probable Cause | Chapter 8
So we did collect his cell phone. And the cell phone, like I said, got, as I mentioned in the press conference yesterday, it's taken a while and it's taken some technology and it's taken a federal partner to have the right technology and the right amount of time to crack into the cell phone. But as of yesterday, we're into the cell phone.
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Probable Cause | Chapter 8
I have a brief statement about some recent developments in the Dana Ireland case and then I would be happy to answer any questions you might have. In the nearly 33 years since Dana Ireland was kidnapped, raped and killed, the Hawaii Police Department has remained resolute in investigating this case and following that evidence wherever it might lead.
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Probable Cause | Chapter 8
We remain committed to solving this case and helping bring closure both to the Ireland family and to the Big Island community. Earlier this year, an FBI agent from the Honolulu field office contacted our police investigators with the names of some people who could potentially be identified as unknown male number one. One of the names provided was that of 57-year-old Albert Loro Jr. Loro Jr.
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Probable Cause | Chapter 8
lived in the Kapoho area, which is a scene of the Ireland murder at the time of the murder. In the weeks since, investigators collected a utensil that Loro Jr. had been using after he discarded it, and the DNA from that utensil was analyzed and found to be a match to unknown male number one. Tragically, Loro died on July 23rd.
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Probable Cause | Chapter 8
So there has been significant reporting, there's been some filings for cases coming up on Tuesday, and there have been three main issues that have been brought up through that reporting and through that filing that I wanted to address before I take any questions.
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Probable Cause | Chapter 8
The second question I want to address is what would have happened if Laurel had been arrested on or around July 19th when we brought him in for a consensual interview? Would he still be alive today? So the answer to that, again, is a little bit complicated. We have to take a look at what would have happened if we had made an arrest without probable cause.
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Probable Cause | Chapter 8
As any good attorney, defense attorney or prosecutor or police officer will tell you, if you make an arrest without probable cause, anything that follows that arrest, whether it be a confession or physical evidence or the identity of another witness, anything that arises out of that arrest is going to be challenged based on what we knew during the arrest.
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Probable Cause | Chapter 8
So we faced the very real possibility that if we had arrested Mr. Laurel without probable cause, that anything we gathered as a result of that process could be excluded, which is absolutely not what we wanted.
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Probable Cause | Chapter 8
The other thing to consider is this. If we had made the decision to arrest Mr. Laurel on July 19th, then his name, his identity would have been made public several days before he ultimately decided to commit suicide.
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Probable Cause | Chapter 8
I can't imagine, if he had been arrested, that within 48 hours, as required by Hawaii Revised Statute, that the prosecutor's office or any state agency would have authorized us levying a charge, which means that within 48 hours, Mr. Lora would have been released, and all of you would have been standing in his driveway to welcome him home. Because it's a story, right? It's important.
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Probable Cause | Chapter 8
So there were parts and there were pieces of the investigation that we held close to the vest. But we did that on purpose. As I mentioned, what I feel would have been the best evidence in this case would have come from Mr. Laurel. Unfortunately, we're not in a situation where we can get that from him now.
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Probable Cause | Chapter 8
My name is Ben Moskowitz. I'm the Chief of Police for the Hawaii Police Department. I've been here about a year and a half. Before joining the Hawaii Police Department, I was a major in Honolulu, in the Honolulu Police Department, and I worked there about 22, 22 and a half years.
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Probable Cause | Chapter 8
I appreciate the opportunity because it's very difficult to squeeze a kind of a freshman-level constitutional law class that a lot of people don't have or don't understand into a 20-second soundbite that is not going to translate well. And that's why this is perfect, and I appreciate the opportunity.
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Probable Cause | Chapter 8
In the criminal justice world, when police get sent to a case or there's some sort of report of some sort of crime, we determine that a crime has occurred or we have probable cause to believe that a crime has occurred. The threshold for us to apprehend a suspect, to issue a citation, like for driving without a license, for instance, or to make a physical arrest
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Probable Cause | Chapter 8
is that we need to have probable cause. So the law in Hawaii defines probable cause as evidence that would lead a reasonable person to believe that a crime has been committed and that the suspect committed the crime. That differs significantly from the level of evidence that we would need to convict someone. So in order to convict someone, the Constitution sets forth a much higher burden, right?
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Probable Cause | Chapter 8
So in this particular case, in order to arrest a suspect, whether it be issue a citation in lieu of physical arrest or physically arrest them, which would mean bring them to the station, take their fingerprints, take their picture, and at that point, take a criminal investigation and confer that case with the prosecutors and let the prosecutors decide, are they going to accept the case?
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Probable Cause | Chapter 8
Are they going to send the case back and want more investigation? Are they not going to accept the case? That conferral process happens after this decision by the investigator, is there probable cause or not for an arrest? So again, because each crime contains multiple elements often, we have to be able to establish probable cause for each element.
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Probable Cause | Chapter 8
So back to our shooting example, the fact that someone died is one of the elements, but the intent of the person is another of the elements. So we'd have to be able to establish each of these elements and probable cause for each of the elements in each crime. All right. So I hope that makes some level of sense.
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Probable Cause | Chapter 8
Not only am I the police chief, I'm also a coroner. I actually ordered myself some scrubs. I'll show them to you. They just showed up the other day. I got here and I was like, I'm the coroner too. We need to parse that out. There needs to be an independent review body besides the police department. So anyway, sorry, back to the story.
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Probable Cause | Chapter 8
So when he kills himself, it's our responsibility as the coroner, or my deputy coroners that are out there, to help establish evidence that proves manner and cause of death. Because we contract, we don't do the autopsies, right? The scrubs are a bit of a tongue-in-cheek joke, but they really do exist.
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Probable Cause | Chapter 8
So we contract out the autopsies, we contract out other things, and then we put all that together and we have a physician sign off on whatever the cause and manner of death is. But that's part of our responsibility.