Honolulu mayor: Prison may be ‘safest place’ to ride out COVID-19

Mayor Kirk Caldwell’s comments contradict the CDC and the experience of correctional facilities across the country where coronavirus is spreading rapidly.

Honolulu Mayor Kirk Caldwell on Tuesday objected to efforts to relieve overcrowding at Hawaiʻi’s correctional facilities amid the coronavirus pandemic, claiming that “our prison could actually be the safest place in terms of COVID-19.”

The mayor was responding to a submission by the state public defender’s office to the Hawaiʻi Supreme Court listing 426 inmates who could be released—including 137 inmates at the Oʻahu Community Correctional Center.

There have been no confirmed cases of COVID-19 in Hawaiʻi’s over-capacity correctional settings, but positive tests are “inevitable” and will put inmates and staff at “tremendous risk,” Hawaiʻi State Public Defender James Tabe said. Kauaʻi Prosecuting Attorney Justin Kollar called the status quo “a ticking time bomb.”