A law requiring all police agencies statewide to maintain publicly available written policies regarding minimum standards on the use of force went into effect Jan. 1.
The new law also allows use-of-force policies and training to be introduced as evidence in judicial or administrative proceedings. In addition, the statute requires law enforcement officers to report the use of excessive force by another law enforcement officer, and that officers receive training designed to minimize the use of excessive force.
Act 190, signed into law last July by Gov. Josh Green, was the result of Senate Bill 151 in the 2023 legislative session, introduced by Oahu Democratic Sens. Stanley Chang, Karl Rhoads and Maile Shimabukuro.
Hawaii Police Department Chief Ben Moszkowicz submitted written testimony about the bill that said he supported its intent but opposed the measure in the form it was passed into law.
“Most of what the Senate bill was trying to accomplish in Act 190, we were kind of in compliance with all of that, already,” Moszkowicz said Tuesday.
The State of Hawaii Organization of Police Officers, the powerful statewide police union, submitted testimony in “strong opposition” to the measure that became law.
SHOPO President Bobby Cavaco called the bill “another attempt to have government intervene in matters that are the kuleana of the county police departments and their respective police chiefs.”
“The bill does not account for the inherent dangers in our jobs that require split-second life and death decisions while under extreme duress, and also ignores the multi-layers of safeguards already in place that hold each and every county police officer accountable for their individual actions and omissions, both administratively and criminally,” he wrote.
Cavaco also wrote that the bill “appears to be an attempt to appease and pacify the minority of people who are anti-police and have asked the Legislature to defund the police department.”
“Without our well-trained police officers, society cannot maintain its civility or its rule of law,” he wrote. Cavaco added that the law subjects officers “to constant attack by bills such as this which makes their jobs tenuous, dangerous and exposes them to civil liability.”
Also submitting comments about the bill and seeking its modification were state Attorney General Anne Lopez and the Honolulu and Kauai police departments.
Moszkowicz said the use-of-force policy is provided on HPD’s website under General Orders. They can be found under “About us” on the navigation bar atop the home page at hawaiipolice.com. It’s a part of General Order 300, titled “Standards of Conduct.”
On the subject of “excessive use of physical force,” General Order 300 states, “Officers shall not use any more physical force than is necessary to accomplish the immediate police purpose.” It also states, “The malicious use of physical force by sworn personnel which results in bodily injury or that causes physical pain, illness or any impairment of physical condition of another person is prohibited.”
“Our policies already requires mandatory reporting of malicious use of force or strange use of force occurrences,” Moszkowicz said. “And we do reporting after every use of force. We have a memo that we’re converting into kind of a binary yes/no, collect data, multiple choice type of questions.
“So, every time an officer uses force beyond routine handcuffing, they’re reporting what they did and why they did it. Then, that triggers supervisory review, where the sergeant or the watch commander looks at the body cam footage and looks at the reports of injuries, and photographs and incident reports and makes a first-glance assessment as to whether or not the use of force is within the policy. And that floats through an administrative channel that ensures that the use of force complies with the letter and the spirit” of the policy.
Moszkowicz said the answers to the questions on the report form “will allow us to catch the data right after the incident in a way that we can then use that data downstream to come up with a little better use-of-force reporting.”
He said those reports will provide data that answers questions such as, “How many times did an officer use pepper spray? How many times was it effective? How many times did the office unholster their taser?
“Things like that.”
Email John Burnett at jburnett@hawaiitribune-herald.com.