Newswatch

By Star-Bulletin Staff

Monday, May 12, 1997

Some female inmates
may be sent to Texas

Female prisoners most likely will be included when the state transfers an additional 300 inmates to Texas, say Gov. Ben Cayetano and a high-ranking corrections official.

Cayetano and Ted Sakai, administrative assistant to Public Safety Director Keith Kaneshiro, said in separate interviews that the date of the transfer from Hawaii's overcrowded prison system hasn't yet been determined. For security reasons, the move won't be announced beforehand, they said.

"We'll have 300 inmates on the public highway," Sakai said. "We don't want 300 inmates escaping."

The female inmates would not be sent to the Newton County Correctional Facility, a privately run jail 80 miles northeast of Beaumont. It houses the first wave of 300 inmates - all men - from Hawaii.

Instead, the Department of Public Safety is considering "more than one place" in Texas for isle women inmates, Sakai said. He declined to identify the facilities.The men in the next transfer will be sent to the privately run jail in Newton County, Sakai said.

Hawaii's state prison system is currently about 1,000 inmates over its operational capacity of 2,760.

Sakai said medium-security inmates will be sent to Texas in the next transfer. Medium-security prisoners also were in the first, which occurred in December 1995 under a three-year contract with The Bobby Ross Group, which offers private correctional services.

That contract costs the state $5 million a year, about $16,000 per prisoner each year, compared to the annual in-state cost of $28,000 for each inmate.

Funds for the next transfer will be available when the new fiscal year begins July 1. The Legislature set aside $5 million for the transfer in 1997-98. In the following fiscal year, 1998-99, the Legislature set aside $10 million - $5 million to keep the second wave of prisoners in Texas and another $5 million to ship a third wave of 300 prisoners out of state.

Meanwhile in Spur, Texas, at least seven prisoners were injured in a disturbance Friday night at the privately run Dickens County Correctional Center that houses inmates from Hawaii, Montana and Colorado.

One inmate was released yesterday; two others remained hospitalized, one in critical condition.

The demonstration began when about 120 inmates refused to begin work assignments or return to barracks in a protest over medical care, food and strip searches.

Sakai said the state has not had any significant problems with its initial transfer of prisoners to the Newton County Correctional Facility.

Murder trial's main witness
has a record

In the trial of accused killer Wallace Rodrigues, the government will rely on testimony from a man with a criminal record whom the defense said shouldn't be trusted because of the plea agreement he signed.

Attorneys gave opening statements today in the trial of Rodrigues, who is accused of shooting to death Wayne Pemberton on April 11, 1995, on Palehua Road.

The government is basing much of its case on the testimony of Samson Fernandez, who said he saw Rodrigues, also know as "Ditto," murder Pemberton, 28.

Defense attorney Pamela O'Leary Tower said Fernandez, who gave his statement to police in November of that year after he was arrested on another crime, had a history of omitting and changing details in his statements to police.

Fernandez signed a plea agreement three months later, after he was allegedly involved in a burglary case and other crimes.

Prosecuting attorney Dwight Nadamoto said Fernandez left out details during his first statement because he was afraid he might be accused of the murder.

Fernandez said he and Rodrigues met Pemberton on Palehua Road and that the other two smoked ice there.

Pemberton got out of the car to speak with Fernandez, and then Rodrigues came out of the car and shot him, Fernandez said.

Fernandez led police to where the murder weapon was buried. The weapon had no fingerprints, O'Leary Tower said.

The victim, Rodrigues and Fernandez all have criminal records.

See expanded coverage in today's Honolulu Star-Bulletin.
See our [Info] section for subscription information.

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Police/Fire


By Star-Bulletin staff

Police to charge man
in death of musician

A 20-year-old Palolo man will be charged with murder in the connection with the April 25 beating death of self-employed electrician and jazz musician Francis King.

The suspect, who resides in the 2400 block of 10th Avenue, was involved in a dispute with King over money owed to him, police said.

He was arrested at 12:45 p.m. yesterday by homicide Det. Harold Fitchett.

King was found dead in the living room of his Hanakealoha Place residence, located just off 10th Avenue.

Other Police/Fire headlines
in today’s Star-Bulletin:

• Pair charged in attack on cabbie; one at large
  
• Man arrested after standoff with police
  
• Two stabbing incidents under investigation
  
• Clothes rack set afire in Kmart warehouse

See expanded coverage in today's Honolulu Star-Bulletin.
See our [Info] section for subscription information.