Lee Cataluna: Rushing to judge Honolulu prosecutor

Whoa now. That instant justice thing only works on TV.

When a shadow of wrongdoing hangs over any public figure, the current Twitter culture demands swift comeuppance, immediate sentencing, total vanquishing.

Blame “American Idol” or “The Apprentice” or decades of “Law &Order” for training people to expect things to come to a satisfying conclusion in under an hour. Blame the current political climate where officials are taken down by a tweet. Blame the community’s lack of faith in government and the court system. No need for torches and pitchforks when the angry mob can go online from the comfort of their couch to demand someone be run out of town.

Honolulu Prosecutor Keith Kaneshiro is on the business end of those pitchforks right now. Why? Because he received a target letter from the FBI letting him know he was under investigation.

Investigation for what?

Well, in this case, that’s not something you can sum up in a short statement. Not murder. Not drugs. Neither assault nor theft. That kind of stuff would be easy to understand and might warrant an angry social media mob demanding his impeachment. But it’s not that. What it is is a tangled mess.

In fact, the online petition to impeach Kaneshiro uses 785 words to argue why Kaneshiro should be impeached and it never even gets to the part about the former police chief’s mailbox.

Not to stand up for Kaneshiro or to argue his innocence, but what’s getting lost here is the process by which our justice system is set up to work. It takes time for investigations to reach completion and for cases to take shape, move toward adjudication and come to a resolution. There’s no option for immediate decisions, no text-voting Kaneshiro off the island.

In the past few weeks, Kaneshiro’s management of the prosecutor’s office and how he handled the ominous investigation into former deputy prosecutor Katherine Puana Kealoha’s professional conduct has dominated the local news cycle. Federal investigators picked an unfortunate time to mail their holiday greetings to Kaneshiro and his aides since there’s absolutely nothing else going on locally to distract the public or to fill the news maw.

Should he step down? Probably. Everyone who has ever had a beef with him is taking this opportunity to make the best of his weak position, including the person who started the petition, a game-room operator who was unsuccessfully prosecuted by Kaneshiro’s office.

Though Kaneshiro’s been a public figure for a long time, he did nothing to create an image in the public mind as a crimefighter; with his aloof and uncommunicative style he comes across as a career bureaucrat, not an advocate for crime victims. So even for those inclined to give him the benefit of the doubt, there isn’t much to grab onto.

The one thing we know for sure is that he’s a loyal boss — just ask Katherine Kealoha.

He doesn’t have to quit. But he shouldn’t wait to be impeached. Just step aside for now, until all of the elements of this murky criminal investigation are revealed and real evidence is presented.

If he’s going to get the boot, let it happen in the light.

Reach Lee Cataluna at 529-4315 or lcataluna@staradvertiser.com.