As of late last week, the Honolulu Police Commission agenda was still silent regarding any serious or comprehensive study or reaction to the disastrous murder in front of the Kapolei police station.

The agenda at least did make mention of the particularly irritating HPD embrace of radio secrecy as police radio transmissions have been encrypted. The agenda does note “Discussion of HPD media notification due to implementation of P25 radio system.”

In a way, radio silence can serve as a metaphor for the Honolulu police’s reaction to the entire debate regarding how much the police will make public about their operations.

It could be argued that the catch-all phrase in the agenda — “Report on departmental activities including but not limited to crime, traffic, upcoming departmental events, and/or other issues related to the Honolulu Police Department including an update on sufficiency of personnel response and resources related to COVID-19” — doesn’t really get to the point of how the commission is guiding the police.

The commission and even investigators have yet to publicly comment on the Kapolei incident on Feb. 15 as the glaring disaster it was. Because the police are redoing their Beretania Street cellblocks, persons arrested overnight are taken to the Kapolei police station and if not detained, they are let go in Kapolei even if arrested downtown.

That is what happened earlier this month when a homeless woman was arrested in Waikiki, taken to Kapolei, and upon release, was bludgeoned to death after being released by the police. The person who alleged assaulted her was Michael K. Armstrong, 36, who was arrested at the scene for second-degree murder.

The Honolulu Star-Advertiser report said Armstrong himself had been arrested “for allegedly assaulting a Honolulu police officer and another person in Mililani.”

Court records show Armstrong has a history of mental health issues and was acquitted in 2007 by reason of insanity in a felony burglary, unauthorized control of a propelled vehicle and theft case on Hawaii island, according to the newspaper.

Clearly much more needs to be publicly examined about this case, starting with the names of all the police officials who made the decisions leading up to the early morning murder.

Those arrested are not judged guilty; it is not the job of the police to punish those arrested.

Still, as the nagging, consistent police vacancy crisis shows, being a police officer is much more than a tough, demanding profession. And it certainly shouldn’t be conducted without public examination.

All this is to say that as the police commission has yet to pick a new police chief, now is the time to renew with increased vigor the call for an aggressively open department.

One could say that because a formerly hired police chief, Louis Kealoha, is now serving time in federal prison, the commission members should be expected to bear down on their hiring practices.

Nothing would be more welcome than a police commission that wants a chief who specifically and clearly says it will do a better job of not just communicating with the public, but also ordering those down the line to candidly answer questions at the scene, on the record with honesty.

Richard Borreca writes on politics on Sundays. Reach him at 808onpolitics@gmail.com.