Disparities claimed
in mortuary arrests

The lawyer for the Diegos says
3 family members were
unlawfully detained

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By Rod Thompson
rthompson@starbulletin.com

HILO >> State officials may have subjected three members of Robert Diego's family to "unlawful detention" during an investigation of Memorial Mortuary, family attorney Brenda Carreira says.

Carreira was prepared to argue that position in court yesterday when the state Attorney General's Office ordered the release without charges of Memorial General Manager Robert Diego, his wife and owner of the mortuary, Momi Diego, and their daughter, Bobby Jean Diego.

The three were arrested 24 hours earlier by attorney general investigators and were held by Hawaii County police.

Attorney general investigators have not responded to repeated Star-Bulletin requests for comments.

The attorney general has said the mortuary is under investigation for possible theft of caskets in the 1980s and for failure in the 1990s to have licenses to sell pre-need funeral plans and to do embalming.

Carreira said the Diegos were arrested Wednesday without a warrant, which is legal but unusual in these circumstances.

A warrantless arrest is usually done immediately after a crime is committed, Carreira said. In the Diegos' case, the attorney general has known about the accusation against them since last summer, she said.

The attorney general told Big Island police not to allow the Diegos contact with their family while in custody, which is a violation of law, Carreira said.

The Diegos were not initially read their rights, Carreira said. That is not illegal, since no attempt was made to question them, she said. Their rights were finally read just before they were released. That is unusual, she said.

The law requires authorities to be actively investigating a case when suspects are held without charges, she said. Police told her that investigators said they were questioning potential witnesses, but she received no independent confirmation of that.

Carreira said she received reports of three potential witnesses, questioned previously, who felt investigators threatened them.

The potential witnesses said investigators told them if they did not say what the investigators wanted to hear, they could "go down."

"It's a crime. You don't threaten people," Carreira said.

Robert Diego said: "We've never stolen any caskets. We've never committed any crimes. This was all brought up by Lucille Mossman (Diego's former girlfriend)."

Regarding a period after 1995 when Diego did not have a license to sell pre-need plans, he said he thought funeral insurance was better then.

Regarding a period when Memorial did not have an embalming license, Diego said he contracted out the work to others, such as Borthwick Mortuary.