Probably because there are so few Blacks there??

[theking]

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No mass protests after Honolulu police shoot, kill Black man

Honolulu police shot and killed Lindani Myeni, a Black man, three months after he moved to Hawaii with his wife, believing it would be safer place to raise their two Black children

[Solemn Wind]

:

No mass protests after Honolulu police shoot, kill Black man

Honolulu police shot and killed Lindani Myeni, a Black man, three months after he moved to Hawaii with his wife, believing it would be safer place to raise their two Black children

Judging by his name, he’s an African black...not these ghetto American blacks that’s why there’s no protest. It seems like these ghetto American blacks hates African blacks just as much as white people and the police.

[theking]

‘We say it’s a racial paradise’: how two police killings are dividing Hawaii

Cases of Iremamber Sykap and Lindani Myeni have challenged the state’s view of itself as a ‘mixing pot’ free of discrimination

In April, as many Americans sat glued to their screens watching the trial of Derek Chauvin, two fatal police shootings in Honolulu went largely unnoticed.

The killings of Iremamber Sykap, a Micronesian teeenager shot by an officer eight times, and Lindani Myeni, a 29-year-old Black man who had recently moved to Hawaii with his wife and children, took place just nine days apart.

While there were no witness videos of the killings, the cases involved unarmed people of color, and saw police initially release misleading statements about the circumstances. Yet the deaths have struggled to break through into the national conversation, and, while attention has grown as new information emerges, the deaths have failed to prompt the widespread outcry in Hawaii that has turned other victims on the mainland into household names.

Local civil rights advocates say the reasons behind this are complex and multifaceted. The reaction to police killings on Oʻahu may differ from the mainland because of the diverse racial demographics on the island and within the police force itself, some say, while others point out that Hawaii’s vision of itself as a multicultural paradise has made it harder for those who experience discrimination and racism to speak out.

The responses to Myeni and Sykap’s deaths have not been entirely muted; there have been protests calling for justice and police reform, but also counter rallies in support of the Honolulu police department. Kenneth Lawson, a civil rights academic at the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa law school, said if the shootings had happened on the mainland, there would have been a greater backlash.

This is in part due to Hawaii’s history of being traditionally trusting of law enforcement, said Lawson, who is Black, noting that “people here are willing to give the police the benefit of the doubt,” despite a lack of transparency that is consistent with many mainland police departments. He also noted that it took a federal investigation to reveal that the former Honolulu police chief, Louis Kealoha, and his wife, Katherine Kealoha, who was a deputy prosecuting attorney, had committed crimes including framing her uncle and stealing money from her grandmother.

Immigrants from a broad swathe of places – including China, Japan, Korea, the Philippines, Puerto Rico and Portugal – have found their way to Hawaii over the last 200 years, making it one of the most diverse states in the US. Because of this, many people of color experience less discrimination and racism in Hawaii than on the mainland, but it is not a paradise for everyone. Last year, investigations by local news outlets showed that Honolulu police officers disproportiona tely arrested and used force against Black people and Pacific Islanders.

“I think it’s a lot harder to call out racism here because of the history of Hawaii,” says Nikkya Taliaferro, a 17-year-old activist and the former executive director of the youth-led advocacy group Hawaii for Black Lives.

“We really like to say it’s a racial paradise and it’s a mixing pot,” she adds, saying this means discrimination can get swept under the rug because people are reluctant to face it.

‘There is a target on you’

On 5 April, Iremamber Sykap, 16, was shot and killed by Honolulu police after a car chase. Police said the car Sykap was driving had been linked to other crimes and that they saw a firearm, but video described in court documents from the city’s prosecuting attorney later revealed it was only a cellphone.Young Iremamber Sykap fishing in Hawaii with his grandmother in 2012. Photograph: Ann Hansen/AP

On 14 April, Honolulu police fatally shot Myeni after being called out to a rental property. A Ring video – obtained through a wrongful death lawsuit brought by Myeni’s widow, Lindsay, and released in June – showed Myeni entering the rental, which Lindsay has said she thinks her husband believed was a Hare Krishna temple on the same block. The footage also shows Myeni said “sorry” as he left the home.

Police have said that Myeni was acting “odd” when he walked into a residence, and later punched the police officers, leaving one with a concussion. Body cam videos, released on 16 April, showed that as the altercation starts Myeni asks “Who are you?” before officers use a stun gun on him and then shoot him.

On 30 June the city prosecuting attorney, Steve Alm, said he would not charge the officers, saying the shooting was justified because Myeni was assaulting the officers. He also released new information, saying that Myeni had interacted with other police officers about 30 minutes before the shooting in another part of Honolulu.

Myeni’s family are continuing to fight their wrongful death lawsuit, arguing that officers failed to identify themselves and that Myeni was “lawfully defending himself”.

“The civil case is not affected by [Alm’s] decision, and so we continue to move ahead,” James Bickerton, an attorney for the family, told the Guardian. “In the civil case we will address the central questions that Mr Alm appears to have avoided completely. When you avoid addressing the very first wrongful act committed, your analysis of what comes afterwards should not be accepted by the public.”

Representative s for the Sykap family declined to comment on the case against the officers charged with his killing.

Myeni and Sykap were both born elsewhere – Myeni in South Africa, where the outcry over his death has been more fervent, and Sykap in Guam.

I think it’s a lot harder to call out racism here because of the history of Hawaii
Nikkya Taliaferro
Guam is a US territory in Micronesia, making Sykap a US citizen, while his family is from Chuuk, one of the four states in Federated States of Micronesia, which has a treaty with the US that allows people to work in the states in exchange for military use of the region. Josie Howard, the chief executive officer at We Are Oceania, a nonprofit that works to empower Micronesians in Hawaii, says that many people in Hawaii would only see someone like Sykap as a Micronesian, not an American.

“Often people lump all Micronesians together and think Micronesia is one culture, and one island,” said Howard, when in fact the north-western Pacfic region of Micronesia includes more than 2,000 islands and many diverse cultures. “That makes it really hard for us, because our experience has been that we’re always misunderstood.”

She said it is most difficult for Micronesian children in Hawaii, who are often bullied in school. “I have kids that shared their stories of other students calling them cockroaches,” said Howard, because of their skin color and other harmful stereotypes. “Being a Micronesian teenager, especially a male, there is a target on you.”

Honolulu is a diverse city – with 21.6% of the population identifying as white, 42.9% as Asian, 9.6% as Native Hawaiian or Pacific Islanders, and 22.8% as mixed race. But just 2.8% of Honolulu’s population identifies as Black, according to the US Census, while Micronesians are estimated to make up only 1% of the state population.