STAND. COM. REP. NO. 2218

 

Honolulu, Hawaii

                  

 

RE:    S.B. No. 2149

       S.D. 1

 

 

 

Honorable Ronald D. Kouchi

President of the Senate

Twenty-Eighth State Legislature

Regular Session of 2016

State of Hawaii

 

Sir:

 

     Your Committee on Public Safety, Intergovernmental, and Military Affairs, to which was referred S.B. No. 2149 entitled:

 

"A BILL FOR AN ACT RELATING TO FORFEITURE,"

 

begs leave to report as follows:

 

     The purpose and intent of this measure is to establish a working group to review and discuss Hawaii's forfeiture laws and make recommendations to improve those laws to better fit their intended purpose.

 

     Your Committee received testimony in support of this measure from the Department of the Attorney General, Department of the Prosecuting Attorney for the City and County of Honolulu, Department of the Prosecuting Attorney for the County of Maui, Office of the Prosecuting Attorney for the County of Hawaii, Honolulu Police Department, and one individual.  Your Committee received testimony in opposition to this measure from the Drug Policy Form of Hawaii.

 

     Your Committee finds that asset forfeiture is a highly specialized mechanism that is grounded in civil law, but closely related to criminal law.  The intent of asset forfeiture laws are to remove the products or proceeds of crime from the community, while also depriving the owners of those products or proceeds if the owners knew that the property was connected to criminal activity.  News stories concerning abuses of asset forfeiture have recently brought this issue to the attention of the public.  Your Committee finds that a working group representing a broad spectrum of parties who are experienced in or impacted by asset forfeiture or asset forfeiture laws is the best way to examine asset forfeiture laws in Hawaii and make recommendations on how those laws could better suit their intended purpose.

 

     Your Committee has amended this measure by:

 

     (1)  Adding representatives from the American Civil Liberties Union, Drug Policy Forum of Hawaii, and Office of the Public Defender to the working group; and

 

     (2)  Making a technical, nonsubstantive amendment for the purposes of clarity and consistency.

 

     As affirmed by the record of votes of the members of your Committee on Public Safety, Intergovernmental, and Military Affairs that is attached to this report, your Committee is in accord with the intent and purpose of S.B. No. 2149, as amended herein, and recommends that it pass Second Reading in the form attached hereto as S.B. No. 2149, S.D. 1, and be referred to your Committees on Judiciary and Labor and Ways and Means.

 

Respectfully submitted on behalf of the members of the Committee on Public Safety, Intergovernmental, and Military Affairs,

 

 

 

________________________________

CLARENCE K. NISHIHARA, Chair