Families of victims like Andrew Nakoa Jr. — who died of a stab wound 21 years ago blocks from his home — now will be able to get a copy of the closing report from Hawaii law enforcement under a new law designed to answer lingering questions that haunt them.
Under Act 17, any immediate family member has the right to a copy of the final report or summary of any investigation by any state law enforcement agency.
Closing reports detail
the steps of investigations, excluding any information regarding minors and confidential personal information of people mentioned, such as witnesses.
Family members will be able to receive the documents once all trials are completed, or five years since a report was written, or if it has been seven years since the event — whichever comes first.
The only exemption where a family would be temporarily denied access to the records would occur if police reopened the case within six months before the family made its request. Then the family has to wait until it’s closed again.
Act 17, introduced as Senate Bill 112, was opposed by the Honolulu Department of the Prosecuting Attorney, which argued that closed cases still can be reopened and solved.
“New forensic technologies, particularly the growth of DNA databases, have recently offered fresh leads in cold cases,” the Prosecutor’s Office wrote in testimony. “Completing a closing report does not necessarily terminate all relevant legal proceedings.”
The Hawaii County Police Department also wrote testimony in opposition, saying releasing details of an investigation could compromise a case’s integrity.
“It would grant access to witness information, potential witness details, and specific evidence, potentially jeopardizing the case, hinder future progress, and reduce the likelihood of identifying a suspect and securing a prosecution,” wrote Hawaii County Police Chief Benjamin Moszkowicz.
Act 17 became effective immediately after Gov. Josh Green signed SB 112 into law April 10.
SB 112 was introduced
by Senate Judiciary Committee Chair Karl Rhoads (D, Nuuanu-Downtown-Iwilei) on behalf of Andrew Nakoa Sr., who went on a
decades-long quest to obtain the Honolulu Police Department’s closing report on what Nakoa called his son’s “murder” investigation.
His frustration would later lead him to enroll in a private college and eventually obtain a degree in criminal justice.
“We felt like we needed to put some kind of timeline on it because murder doesn’t have a statute of limitations,” Rhoads told the Honolulu Star-Advertiser by phone.
“Theoretically, all unsolved murder cases are all open cases, but in practice they’re not,” he said. “It’s a box of documents sitting on a shelf somewhere.”
Rhoads knows that SB 112 received majority testimony in opposition, but believes the new law gives families information they deserve.
“I felt like their objections were outweighed by the need for people to know what happened in these kinds of situations,” Rhoads said.
Nakoa Sr. hopes Act 17 will spare other families the stress and heartache he felt while searching, for over a decade, for information about how his son died.
“I feel glad that now people can have easier access to it, to not have to go through what we went through,” he said.
On the night of Oct. 15, 2004, Nakoa Sr. had a gut feeling that something bad was going to happen to his son and pleaded with his 21-year-old namesake to stay inside their Mayor Wright Housing unit.
Nakoa Jr., a security guard and a breakdancer nicknamed “Ripsta” for his smooth rap skills, agreed to stay home with his friends — but only after a quick beer run to Fuji Market on King Street.
“My last words to him were ‘Be careful out there,’ and he goes, ‘No worry, Dad’ — his last three words,” Nakoa Sr. said.
He had no idea that his gut feeling about his son would come true moments later and just a few blocks from home, Nakoa Sr. told the Star-Advertiser as he sat with daughter Beatrice and wife Bernice at the Vineyard Boulevard Zippy’s.
“We waited — a half-hour went by and that was too long,” he said. “One of his friends came running. I was in the kitchen. He told us, ‘Uncle, your son got stabbed at Fuji Market.’”
Nakoa Sr. and daughter Beatrice, 20 at the time, ran to the scene.
“I was stepping in his blood and everything,” Beatrice said as she remembered her brother on the pavement.
Nakoa Sr. did everything he could.
“I just couldn’t believe it,” he said, he said, his eyes dropping to the custom shirt he wore at Zippy’s that was imprinted with an image of his son, arms open wide, as if reaching out for a hug.
“I tried to revive him. I gave him CPR until the paramedics came and took over.”
The case was closed in February 2005 with the primary suspect, a 17-year-old who claimed “self-defense,” let off without charges.
Nakoa Sr. still has questions because his son left the house without a weapon and appeared to have no defensive wounds on his body.
Frustrated by the outcome of his son’s case and that local lawyers were
unwilling to take it on pro bono, he wanted to learn more about Hawaii’s criminal justice system.
“I wanted to find answers, and I went and signed up for Remington College,” he said. “I went there in 2007. I took up criminal justice. I wanted answers.”
Nakoa Sr. then graduated magna cum laude from Remington College in 2011 with a bachelor’s degree in criminal justice and a renewed sense of urgency for details about HPD’s investigation.
HPD told him it would cost $5 for every 200-plus page of the report — which Nakoa could not afford, like other families of victims looking for details of how their love ones died.
Act 17 remains silent on the fees that families can be charged to receive law enforcement reports.
In 2016, Rhoads teamed up with Nakoa Sr. to retrieve the case documents — without hefty charges — but it wasn’t until 2021 when they were actually released.
“We wrote a letter to the Police Department explaining the situation and asking for it,” Rhoads said.
It did not happen quickly — or easily.
“It took us about five years to get it,” Rhoads said. “It was like pulling teeth.”
After reading through the investigation, the only conclusion Nakoa Sr. could draw was that the outcome of his son’s case came down to “sloppy investigation. It wasn’t thorough.”
Nakoa Jr. died over two decades ago, and his family continues “looking for justice,” his father said.
Rhoads knows that for some families like Nakoa Jr.’s, Act 17 won’t bring closure.
But it might provide answers.
“The idea is to get closer to knowing what happened and to see why the police did what they did — or didn’t do,” Rhoads said.
