Two former supervisors of the Honolulu Police Department's vehicle maintenance section are being made scapegoats by the new administration, the attorney for one of the men said. Former HPD motor pool
supervisors plead not
guilty in theft casePoor record-keeping by the city
is to blame, says a defense lawyerBy Debra Barayuga
Star-BulletinVictor Hasebe, 55, and Winston Owan, 46, pleaded not guilty yesterday to charges they purchased auto parts from July 1993 to August 1999 for police vehicles at inflated prices and received kickbacks.
An Oahu grand jury last week indicted the two on charges of first- and second-degree theft, bribery, money laundering and unlawful ownership of a business.
"If something was wrong about the way things were being done in the department for six years, why wasn't anything done about it?" said Cliff Hunt, Hasebe's attorney.
Richard Hoke, attorney for Owan, said his client has been a "dedicated, hard-working" city employee who performed his job as a storekeeper the way he was taught and trained.
The two former city employees are accused of funneling about 75 percent of the department's auto parts business to Larry's Auto Parts in Kaimuki, which allegedly sold parts that cost 30 percent more than other vendors would have charged. In return, the city says, the two received Las Vegas trips, cash and auto parts. The two are also accused of falsifying invoices to obtain high-performance auto parts for their own use.
The police garage manages between 500 and 600 vehicles, and Hasebe is being blamed for poor record-keeping and his ability to procure parts at the last minute, Hunt said.
Auto parts purchases had to have been approved by the department's and the city's finance offices. "Everything he did was approved by higher-ups," he said.
Deputy Prosecutor Randal Lee said that once the community and the jury hear the evidence at trial, they will see how the fraud was perpetuated.
Judge Richard Perkins set trial week for June 18. Lee said that as in the Ewa Village case, other people trusted Hasebe and Owan to do their jobs and should not be faulted if they were not aware about what was going on.
"When you deal with fraud, you're dealing with people concealing information," Lee said.
City & County of Honolulu
