Fighting public corruption continues to be a high priority for the FBI. Its Honolulu office and other federal partners have helped ferret out corruption among Hawaiʻi officials from former Senate President J. Kalani English to former Honolulu Police Chief Louis Kealoha.
A former Kauaʻi County Councilmember is also in prison for drug trafficking and other charges, and a former Hawaiʻi County housing official awaits sentencing for fraud charges.
"What I hope is by publicizing the fact that we have had successful cases and prosecutions with the U.S. Attorney's Office that people will say, 'Enough is enough. I know information about this, I have information, I'd like to tell you about it so that we can just put a stop to this,'" said Steven Merrill, FBI Honolulu special agent in charge.
"In the meantime, the FBI will continue to prosecute these cases with the U.S. Attorney's Office and hopefully, that'll change the behavior of some of our public officials. And I certainly want them to know, on behalf of the FBI, that we're going to continue aggressively investigating corruption for the sake of the people of the state," Merrill said.
He also said the FBI is working to protect against cyberattacks on power grids across the country.
"Luckily we haven't had any activity here as such but we and the FBI around the country are aware that that is a possibility and we're standing ready to respond," Merrill said.
Just last week, the U.S. Department of Justice announced that federal investigators took down a global malware operation.
You can submit a tip to the FBI at tips.fbi.gov. This interview aired on The Conversation on Jan. 30, 2023. The Conversation airs weekdays at 11 a.m. on HPR-1.
