LIHUE — County Attorney Mauna Kea Trask on Thursday cautioned activists who occupied the grounds of the former Coco Palms resort and continue attempting to win title to the property that they are basing their arguments on the authority of a fake court whose “chief justice” is a registered sex offender.
The individual identified as chief justice was convicted of three felony counts of sexual assault in 1998 and sentenced to five years’ imprisonment, according to a letter signed by Trask Thursday morning.
The development was novel even by the standards of a case that has taken numerous unexpected turns.
Trask added that the non-existent “Court of the Sovereign” also does not have the same name as any actual court that existed during the tenure of the Hawaiian Kingdom, which ended when the kingdom was overthrown by American businessmen in 1893.
Trask is from a Hawaiian family whose lineage goes back into the 1800s and whose Native Hawaiian blood traces to generations before that. He said he once espoused many ideas advocated by the Coco Palms occupiers but abandoned them after he went to law school.
The letter speculated that the Coco Palms occupiers had been unwittingly misled by Mainland organizations “with ties to white supremacy.” Trask contended that some Hawaiian independence groups have advocated for “sovereign citizens” unbound by laws of a specific country.
The observations came in a letter signed by Trask and sent Thursday to Noa Mau-Espirito and Charles Hepa, the two chief organizers of the Coco Palms occupation. A day before, the two men sent Trask and Mayor Bernard Carvalho Jr. a document headed “Notice to quit or pay rent” that cited the alleged Court of the Sovereign in a wide array of
demands of county and state officials, two lawyers and a title company in Honolulu that they pay back rent for the property that, Mau-Espirito and Hepa said, amounts to $200 million.
Mau-Espirito and Hepa had cited the fictional court in filings during their trial in District Court in an eviction case brought by Coco Palms Hui, the would-be developer of the resort.
Their earlier filing and the document received by the mayor and county attorney’s office this week asserted authority of “The Hawaiian Judiciary, Court of the Sovereign” which, according to these documents, is presided over by “Chief Justice” Moses Enoka
Heanu.
For several weeks, rumors had circulated that Heanu is a registered sex offender who resides on Hawaii Island. Trask said his office, working with state legal authorities, had verified that the supposed chief justice is the same person listed on the sex offender registry.
“The county does not recognize ‘The Hawaiian Judiciary Court of the Sovereign’ as a lawful court with any jurisdiction whatsoever,” Trask said in his letter, a copy of which was obtained by The Garden Island. “Both federal and state case law is clear that the Hawaiian Kingdom does not exist as a current lawful government.”
The most recent documents identifying the non-existent court had left attorneys and legal observers perplexed that the District Court had even accepted it. However, court officials have explained that clerks are trained to accept almost any document for filing, with the task of sorting out which ones may be fake left for the judge in future court proceedings.
The letter was sent to Mau-Espirito and Hepa at a Lihue address that was on copies of certified letters the county received.
In fact, Trask said, there never was an institution called the Court of the Sovereign during the reign of the Hawaiian Kingdom. The kingdom’s court system included the Superior Court of Hawaii and the Supreme Court of the Kingdom of Hawaii.
Trask said the description of the activities of the “Court of the Sovereign” recycle terminology of white supremacist groups and contended that made up “common law courts” have no authority and exist “to intimidate both private citizens and governmental officials.” Such courts, and the fictional Court of the Sovereign, “have no authority to compel any action by anyone at all.”
Trask cited materials on racist groups maintained by the Southern Poverty Law Center, which tracks racist organizations as mirroring wording commonly used during the Coco Palms occupation. The letter drew no actual connection between the occupiers and such groups.
After a trial that spanned several weeks earlier this year, District Court Judge Michael Soong ruled that the Coco Palms occupiers had no legal right to occupy the property and gave them five days to vacate it. It was not for several weeks, however, that sheriff’s deputies and Kauai Police Department officers descended en masse and removed the occupiers.
On Thursday afternoon, no people were visible in the former encampment off Kuamoo Road in Wailua. Several tents and a portable toilet were still in place and two small pickup trucks were parked in the area the occupiers had used. The area remained largely unfenced and no security personnel were visible.
Trask also sent a memorandum to a variety of state officials “regarding legal information on general Native Hawaiian sovereignty claims.” The memo emphasized it was not a legal document in and of itself but had been prepared to try to respond to numerous questions about the Coco Palms occupation that have flooded the mayor’s and other county offices.
“The legal situation regarding Native Hawaiian sovereignty and self-determination is very complex and while Native Hawaiian people do enjoy certain state and federal constitutional rights and entitlements separate from the non-native population, they must as a political group nonetheless comply with county, state and federal laws like everyone else.”
Trask has maintained a dialogue with Mau-Espirito and Hepa for several weeks. He said he made these connections in part because he, himself, as a young Native Hawaiian subscribed to the same beliefs in the surviving existence of the Hawaiian Kingdom as the
occupiers.
“The county accepts and pursues its legal obligations to Native Hawaiian people,” Trask said in an interview, with an objective to “take care of the emotions first. You have to enter into a dialogue accepting that they are people and they are OUR people.”
It was not clear what the next move by the former occupiers would be, if any. The notice sent to the mayor and county attorney has no legal validity and will be ignored, Trask said.
“The County of Kauai declines to recognize or comply with the demands in your notice,” his letter concluded.
The occupation of Coco Palms began in late 2016. Honolulu-based developers who seek to rebuild the resort, which was badly damaged in Hurricane Iniki in 1992, have said they plan to start construction in the next few months. No construction work has actually
begun.
Mau-Espirito and Hepa could not be reached for comment Thursday.
