With Hawaii farmers suffering millions of dollars of losses annually through theft of their crops, state legislators and law enforcement officials should consider this a serious crime and devise laws that provide growers with better protection and thieves with stiffer penalties. Isle thieves find
crops easy pickingsThe issue: Farmers lose millions
of dollars a year in thefts of
products from their fields.A 1998 law that requires a bill of sale for commodities valued at more than $100 or that weigh more than 200 pounds was a good first step, but penalties amount to no more than a citation and confiscation of the products. Agricultural officials can recall no case in which someone suspected of such theft was taken to court. Moreover, there is little to deter wholesalers and retailers from putting stolen products on the market.
For farmers, such thefts can be devastating. Morton Bassan, a Big Island orange grower, said he is nearly out of business because thefts have cost him $1.9 million over three years. From a bumper crop of 75,000 cases in 1998 to just 15,000 cases this year, Bassan has seen his profits disappear. The security fences and devices Bassan has installed have not cut his losses and police have been ineffective in stopping or catching thieves.
Across the state, flower growers, aquaculture businesses and plant nurseries face the same problem. Many do not run large operations and with narrow profit margins, few can afford the security measures Bassan has installed, making them more vulnerable.
Because of the difficulty in determining whether a product has been stolen -- one cucumber looking pretty much like another -- agricultural officials say theft must be deterred by a system that checks a product from farmer to wholesaler to retailer. The state Department of Agriculture, however, requires more resources to conduct inspections for documentation at big supermarkets as well as at farmers markets where some of the stolen products are sold. Prosecution and penalties should be increased.
Agricultural officials say the thefts are likely to increase as the state's tourism-based economy grows weaker. Raids of crops become far more tempting in hard times.
State Sen. Jan Yagi Buen, chairwoman of the agriculture committee, is conducting hearings on the problem this month, rightly recognizing that theft of a cabbage crop is as grave as theft of money from a bank. Agriculture, a $500-million industry in Hawaii, deserves better protection by the government.
Torture is no option
in terrorist probeThe issue: Talk about U.S.
authorities using torture against
terrorist suspects has emerged.LACK of public access to the law-enforcement and judicial systems inevitably leads to concern about the rights of the accused or, in this anti-terrorist climate, the suspected. Talk has surfaced about the possible use of torture against those being detained in the United States. Such speculative rubbish should be confined to barroom chitchat while the government provides constitutional protections to those being held.
More than 1,100 people have been detained in connection with the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. The White House says the "lion's share" have been released, but hundreds remain behind bars. Officials say about two dozen are believed to have important information about terrorism, and about half of those are suspected of having ties with al-Qaida, the terrorist network.
Newsweek columnist Jonathan Alter has suggested that something short of "cattle prods or rubber hoses" should be considered "to jump-start the stalled investigation of the greatest crime in American history." Alter, considered a liberal until now, suggested that Americans "keep an open mind about certain measures to fight terrorism, like court-sanctioned psychological interrogation" or "transferring some suspects to our less squeamish allies, even if that's hypocritical."
Historian Jay Winik wrote in The Wall Street Journal that torture of convicted terrorist Abdul Hakim Murad by Philippine authorities in 1995 led to foiling a plot to crash American commercial planes into the Pacific and another into CIA headquarters in Virginia. Torture works, Dahlia Lithwick concluded.
"Torture is bad," conceded conservative commentator Tucker Carlson on CNN's "Crossfire." However, he added that torture "may be the lesser of two evils. Because some evils are pretty evil."
Such talk understandably has prompted concern by Sir Nigel Rodley, a British law professor who is the United Nation's investigator on torture. He shares concerns by human-rights activists about excesses in interrogation.
"I haven't received any specific allegations at this stage," he says, "but I am worried as to whether people in detention have had any access to the outside world, especially legal advice, which is a very important protection against the temptation of authorities to resort to torture or similar ill treatment in interrogation."
Rodley, who has investigated alleged torture in 15 countries, says use of extreme measures would send a message "that the values of the international community are no better than the travesty of values that the terrorists themselves purpose to espouse. That way they win."
In short, if someone proposes torture, just say no.
Published by Oahu Publications Inc., a subsidiary of Black Press.Don Kendall, Publisher
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