One day after he resigned as an officer with the Honolulu Police Department, Nelson Tamayori pleaded guilty in U.S. District Court on Wednesday to failing to immediately report that his partner assaulted a patron in an illegal gambling house.
Tamayori, 45, who would have completed 15 years of service with HPD next month, faces a maximum three-year prison term at sentencing in October for failing to report his knowledge of a felony by deliberately omitting information from his official police report.
His lawyer, Thomas Otake, said Tamayori not only lost his police career, but also was fired from his part-time job at Honolulu Airport when the federal prosecutor charged him last week with concealing his knowledge of the assault. Otake said Tamayori is hoping for a probation sentence.
Vincent Morre, 37, pleaded guilty in May to two counts of using his authority as a police officer to deprive a person of his constitutional rights. He faces a maximum 10-year prison term for each count at his sentencing in August.
Morre also resigned from HPD on Tuesday, after nine years of service.
Tamayori told U.S. District Judge J. Michael Seabright that he saw Morre commit the assault, and knew that the amount of force used was not reasonable and in violation of federal law. He said he eventually did report Morre’s actions to HPD’s Professional Standards Office, formerly Internal Affairs, and the FBI three weeks after the assault.
By that time, however, the HPD office had already initiated an investigation into Morre’s actions.
Federal law requires anyone who has knowledge of a felony to report the crime to authorities as soon as possible.
“For all practical purposes, reporting it immediately would have led to possible retaliation against officer Tamayori by some of his fellow officers,” Otake said. “And he would have been alienated from his fellow officers for the rest of his career.”
Otake said Tamayori stepped forward because what Morre did offended him and the knowledge of it weighed on him.
Although an investigation of Morre was underway by the time Tamayori reported it, Otake said the Professional Standards Office has yet to question Tamayori. And he said Tamayori stepped forward before the proprietor of the illegal gambling house released security video of Morre’s assault on two patrons.
The FBI says the video shows Morre, Tamayori and reserve officer Joseph Becera entering Doc’s game room behind McKinley Car Wash on Sept. 5. It shows Morre kicking two seated patrons in the face, striking one of them with his hands, and throwing a chair that struck the other in the head.
Becera, 77, a 37-year volunteer reserve officer, pleaded guilty on Monday to concealing his knowledge of the assault and to lying to the FBI. He faces a maximum three-year prison term for omitting the assault from his official report and a maximum five years for lying. He is scheduled for sentencing on the same day as Tamayori.
