Malu 'Aina

December 30, 2015
Press Release on sloppy, dysfunctional court system
further contact: Jim Albertini Malu ‘Aina Center For Non-violent Education & Action P.O. Box 489 Ola’a (Kurtistown) Hawai’i 96760 Phone 808-966-7622 Email ja@malu-aina.org www.malu-aina.org

I am one of the Mauna Kea protectors arrested on Mauna Kea April 2, 2015.  On Monday, December 28, 2015 at 9:11 AM I filed in person a Motion for Dismissal of the charge of Obstruction at the Hilo District Court.  The motion is below and attached.  December 28th was the deadline for the motion to be filed.  Later that evening I noticed on my stamped copy that the clerk put the date of filing as December 29th instead of the correct date, December 28th.

Good thing I noticed the Hilo District Court clerk, Pamela M Paulo, stamped the wrong date (Dec. 29).    If I hadn’t caught it, and showed up in Waimea Court on Thursday, Jan. 21, 2016 to argue my motion, I can just imagine the deputy prosecutor E. Britt Bailey or the Judge Barbara Takase saying “sorry Mr. Albertini, but you didn’t file your motion on time (deadline Dec. 28).  Motion denied.”  And how could I prove otherwise, since the court stamp date on my motion said Dec. 29?

I went back to the court  on Tuesday, Dec. 29 at 8:40 AM and the same window clerk at traffic window #6 Byron K. Pang was there as on Monday, Dec. 28th.  I told him that District Court clerk Paulo made a mistake of the stamp date yesterday when I filed my motion that could jeopardize my motion. It took about 15 minutes but an affidavit of correction was completed and filed by District Court clerk  Paulo, and notarized by Kathleen K. Sakamoto. I was told that the affidavit would be attached to the motion that I filed yesterday with the corrected date. I received 2 copies of the affidavit with the corrected date attached to my filed motion with the wrong date.

The sad thing is, no one apologized to me about this serious mistake that could have jeopardized my motion nor the inconvenience this caused me to have to make another 25 mile round trip  from Kurtistown to Hilo, put , money in the court house meter, again go through security screening, and present extra copies of my motion. Nor the basic courtesy of failing to tell me yesterday that I should drop a copy of my pro se motion at the prosecutors office, just around the corner from the filing clerk’s window in the courthouse,even when I specifically asked who, if anyone, needs to get copies of my stamped pro se motion besides the original filed with the court.

I wonder how many other court motions or filings were stamped with the incorrect date on Monday or Tuesday?  Or was I singled out?  When did the Court figure out their stamp date was incorrect?  When I brought it to their attention on Tuesday morning, or did they realize their mistake on Monday but failed to notify me and/or others  until I came to the court on Tuesday?

As far as I’m concerned this is just another example of a sloppy, dysfunctional system that feeds off the misery of mainly poor Hawaiian people.  The Hilo Court House was built just a few years ago at a cost of over $90 million dollars.  Another is being built in Kona for a similar figure.  The long Hilo hallways of 2 floors of court rooms with a rather cramped waiting area outside the various courtrooms has the feel of a meat packaging/slaughter house, where animals are moved through chutes, butchered and shrink wrapped, and then moved out.  The lack of common courtesy I received reflects a dysfunctional non-caring impersonal system that needs to be shaken up and changed.  Our current judicial system disproportionately convicts and locks up Hawaiians in prisons.

On April 2 on Mauna Kea there were 31 people arrested.  I believe the group consisted of 28 Hawaiians, 2 haoles and 1 Japanese.  The fact that the State Supreme Court has ruled the TMT permit illegal and yet prosecutions are continuing against those arrested trying to protect sacred Mauna Kea from illegal TMT construction speaks for itself.  I don’t feel I should have had to spend Christmas weekend writing a motion to dismiss the charges.  The judge and the prosecutor should have dismissed the charges against me soon after the Supreme Court decision, but it appears they have no sense of shame nor justice.
My motion (attached and below) speaks to this in more detail for those interested.

Aloha and Happy New Year to you all.

Jim Albertini
Wednesday, Dec. 30, 2015 12:30PM

A Happy & More Just and

Peaceful

New Year for All!

      There are great divides that need healing in Hawaii, the U.S. and the world. Honolulu has the largest number of homeless per capita of any city in the U.S. The gap between rich are poor widens. Here on Hawaii Island there are an increasing number of homeless and people in need of food, while $50-100 million dollar private jets crowd the Kona airport bringing the super rich to vacation in luxury homes and resorts. Native Hawaiians in their illegally occupied homeland, now #4 in census figures are #1 in prison, have the lowest life expectancy, and are at the bottom in nearly every other social category. 27,000 Hawaiians remain on the Hawaiian Homes waiting list while tens of thousands have left Hawaii because they can no longer afford to live here. Working people in general are finding it increasingly difficult to make ends meet while Hawaii becomes a playground for the super-rich.

      Throughout the U.S. the call that “Black Lives Matter” seems to be falling on deaf ears. Nearly every day brings new horrors of police violence which add to the climate of fear and hatred. Hostility to immigrants and refugees by many political candidates only widen divisions.

      Globally, the signs of man-made climate disaster are everywhere. Extremes in weather patterns, intense killer storms can no longer be ignored. The world is in a state of perpetual war with the U.S. leading the way in creating chaos and what the CIA calls “Blowback” – growing hatred and violence in response to U.S. policies of violence –regime change, bombings, drone killings, etc. in a growing number of countries. The U.S. is a global empire: the most heavily armed country in the world and the world’s biggest exporter of weapons. The U.S. exports roughly half of all weapons shipped around the world. A Congressional Research report and a N.Y. Times article about the report says: “Every region of the globe has the same top weapons source: the United States. Three-quarters of U.S. weapons shipments are to the Middle East. Top recipients of U.S. weapons include: Saudi Arabia, Iraq, U.A.E., Israel, Kuwait, Oman, and Egypt. The human-rights respecting liberal democracies among top recipients of U.S. weapons include … no nations whatsoever.” http://www.nytimes.com/2015/12/26/world/middleeast/us-foreign-arms-deals-increased-nearly-10-billion-in-2014.html?

      Add to this list of horrors the increasing risk of further Fukushima nuclear plant catastrophes related to climate disaster storms, plus the risk of nuclear weapons being used by nations, groups, or individuals in escalating cycles of violence. Given all of the above, the prospects for a Happy New Year appear rather bleak. What is needed is a our personal and collective commitment to a more peaceful, just, and livable world and to follow up that commitment with walking the talk. No more hot air! End these wars! Stop the violence! Narrow the divides and heal our communities! If we want peace, work for justice in a way that respects all people and the earth we share. As we say in Hawaii, it’s time to

Live Aloha!

1. Mourn all victims of violence. 2. Reject war as a solution. 3. Defend civil liberties.
4. Oppose all discrimination, anti-Islamic, anti-Semitic, anti-Hawaiian, etc.
5. Seek peace through justice in Hawai`i and around the world.

Contact: Malu ‘Aina Center for Non-violent Education & Action
P.O. Box 489 Kurtistown, Hawai’i 96760
Phone (808) 966-7622. Email: ja@malu-aina.org

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Hilo Peace Vigil leaflet (Jan. 1, 2016 – 745^th week) – Friday 3:30-5PM downtown Post Office

2015 Malu ‘Aina Christmas Appeal

Exhibit A

HOLY WEEK

2015

Bulldoze Your Own Temple?

NO TMT

(Thirty Meter Telescope)

on the Sacred Hawaiian Temple – Mauna Kea!

      In the Christian calendar, April 3rd is Good Friday, the day that commemorates Jesus’ crucifixion by the Roman Empire for the crime of sedition (stirring up the people). Good Friday is part of Holy Week that begins with Palm Sunday and ends with Easter Sunday, the day that Jesus rose from the dead. Also within Holy Week is the important biblical story of Jesus entering the Temple in Jerusalem and driving out the moneychangers who were exploiting the people and defiling the sacred place.

      This week, many Hawaiians and others are taking action to protect Hawaii’s Sacred Temple – Mauna Kea from further desecration – bulldozing for the $1.4 billion Thirty Meter Telescope – TMT, to add to the many telescopes already on the sacred mountain. Hawaiians are asking that their spiritual beliefs, religion, culture, and traditions be taken seriously. They are saying enough desecration. The sacred must come before dollars, jobs, etc. They are saying that Mauna Kea is not a commodity. It is time to honor, respect, and protect Mauna Kea. It is time for aloha ‘aina to be the guiding light for Hawaii and the world.

Aloha Mauna Kea!   Or Don’t We Care?  Has Money Become Our God?

1. Mourn all victims of violence. 2. Reject war as a solution. 3. Defend civil liberties. 4. Oppose all discrimination, anti-Islamic, anti-Semitic, anti-Hawaiian, etc.
5. Seek peace through justice in Hawai`i and around the world.
Contact: Malu `Aina Center for Non-violent Education & Action P.O. Box 489 Kurtistown, Hawai`i 96760.
Phone (808) 966-7622. Email: ja@malu-aina.org http://www.malu-aina.org

Hilo Peace Vigil leaflet (April 3, 2015 – 706th week) – Friday 3:30-5PM downtown Post Office

Exhibit B

TMT on Mauna Kea:

“One more for the road!”

On Friday, February 25, 2011 the State BLNR will be deciding whether to issue a permit for construction of a Thirty Meter Telescope (TMT) atop Mauna Kea. Send testimony to Adaline.F.Cummings@hawaii.gov Below is Jim Albertini’s testimony in opposition.

I am opposed to any and all permits for the TMT on Mauna Kea. I believe the issues of expanding military training and industrial development on Mauna Kea is a microcosm for our fragile world. Our planet is now facing profound life threatening climate change due to the cumulative effects of global industrial development. No single, particular, industrial development can be said to have caused the global tipping point. But it is clear our planet’s ecosystem is now in dire straights due to the cumulative effects of industrial development, and the crisis is accelerating.

As we all know, Mauna Kea is sacred. It is a revered temple by the Kanaka Maoli, the native people of this place, and native people around the Pacific. It is a fragile environment that already has suffered from extensive industrial development. We give lip service to these facts but then we go forward with more industrial development on Mauna Kea. Today, we have the lure of TMT — bigger-is-better, more jobs, world class astronomy status, major PR efforts, and community pay offs by the vested economic and scientific community. But all of this has not stopped the growing tension of science vs the sacred, industrial development vs environmental preservation.

It is time for Hawaii and our world to affirm the sacred over science, environmental preservation over further industrial development. It is time to restore our balance with nature, to become pono. We have become so far out of balance that it is difficult for us to see clearly, to see ourselves as we truly are. In many ways, we have become military/industrial drunks, believing that one more military/ industrial drink won’t hurt us, one more for the road. One more for jobs, one more for “full spectrum dominance” and world class astronomy.

One more industrial drink on the road to global military/industrial destruction is not the answer. TMT is not the answer. More industrial development is not the solution to the problems of industrial development. To find our staggering, drunken, way home to what is pono, is not an easy task. But one thing is clear: the means we use must be in line with the end that we seek. The means and ends must cohere. Industry can no longer dominate the temple and the fragile environment. Those days are over, long gone. Non-violence is a sacred principle we better relearn quickly if we are going to survive as a species.

The meaning of non-violence is clear for those who have eyes to see our present situation. No more military/industrial drinking on Mauna Kea! It is time for clear vision and clear speaking, followed by clear action. Honor and protect Mauna Kea. Deny the TMT permits.

Send the military/industrialists to Rehab!

1. Mourn all victims of violence. 2. Reject war as a solution. 3. Defend civil liberties. 4. Oppose all discrimination, anti-Islamic, anti-Semitic, etc. 5. Seek peace through justice in Hawai`i and around the world.

Contact: Malu `Aina Center for Non-violent Education & Action P.O. Box AB Kurtistown, Hawai`i 96760.

Phone (808) 966-7622. Email ja@interpac.net http://www.malu-aina.org

Hilo Peace Vigil leaflet (Feb. 25, 2011 – 493rd week) – Friday 3:30-5PM downtown Post Office