I recently read Jason Ryan's book "Hell-Bent". It's about a homegrown Hawaiian crime syndicate (similar to the Dixie mafia in the Deep South) that allegedly ran gambling, dope, protection, prostitution,...on the island from the 1960's to the 1980's. It's a great book. It describes in great detail the nefarious activities of several of the island's native heavyweights at the time, such as Wilford Pulawa, Henry Huihui, Larry Mehau, Alvin Kaohu, Eric Naone, Ronnie Ching,...

Anyone heard about these guys back in the 80s?

I've been to Hawaii, but I can't answer your question. I've heard the Hawaiian police have a very heavy (and visible) presence. Hawaii is a warm, sunny place and the cops don't want crooks and gangsters from all over America arriving.

I'm sure these guys were pretty much the equivalent of the Dixie Mafia in the south. They probably got caught or died out the same way. Were they called "The Company" by any chance? I think they were connected more to Asian crime like the Triads or maybe Yakuza, I'm not too familiar with them.

There are other criminal groups in the islands like the Bandidos Mc. I'm sure the Hell's Angels have a presence there as well.

I would assume there would be some kind of cartel involvement nowadays using Hawaii as a jump off point to ship drugs and weapons to Australia and Asian countries, but that's just my opinion.

They were referred to by different names, "The Company" being one of them outside of "The Family", "The Hawaiian Syndicate",... Yeah like you said, probably they were just the Hawaiian version of the Dixie Mafia.

Biker gangs don't seem to make much noise on the island. There appears to be a lot of illegal gambling over there though, mostly ran by Triads, Yakuza, Koreans, Samoans, some Natives,...

That's what I figured Killing, a lot easier to kick back to the countries in the west instead of a family on the east coast.

I could see gambling being a huge money maker, Asians LOVE to gamble on anything.

I don't think there's a Chinatown on earth where there isn't some gambling going on

And in Hawaii, especially the involvement of Chinese and Korean mobs in gambling is well documented. The Japanese most likely have some going on as well. There are many sources indicating that the Yakuza were up to their eyeballs involved in Hawaii's meth trade in the 80's and 90's.

More recently there's also Hawaii's homegrown prison gang, the USO Family, that has become well-known in and outside the prison system. Any Hawaiian prisoner is accepted, but the large majority of its members are of Samoan and Native Hawaiian backgrounds- apparently the two communities with the highest incarceration rate. As with any prison gang it's difficult to make out what is true and what is bullshit. On some other forums there are Hawaii posters -who claim to be 'in the know'- saying that the prison gang is a powerful force in the local underworld, that they control a large part of the drug trade, protection rackets, gambling,... But like I said, when it comes to prison gangs, it's difficult to seperate the real from the fictitious.

Speaking of the Hawaiian gangland, there is a documentary about a policeman murder
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IJQz1qbtY90
and one of the crime bosses featured in the book (Clarence "Japan" Honda) was the one who informed on the killers.

Thanks for sharing Dwalin.
The book also goes into great detail about the murder of the son of a Hawaii prosecutor, Charles Marsland.

The rock must have been boss before the movies. The other nite I watched the new fast n furious on the dark side of the iternet that shit was bad.

KJ, thanks for the post. I have to read this book now.

No problem, the book comes warmly recommended. Entertaining and it tells us more about a seldom talked about gangland.

Recently I read that Hawaiian organized crime is still very active, largely in places like Waianae and Puna. It's definitely something more akin to the "Dixie mafia" in the Gulf Coast and the southern Appalachians and Ozarks as well as the "Cajun mafia" in rural Louisiana. Not anything as large scale as Cosa Nostra, but definitely local mob-like groups that get involved in local politics and run a number of rackets.

Gambling is a huge thing, but they also exploit tourist things like local lava flow tours. They apparently got a stranglehold over that kind of stuff and anyone else trying to step in on these kind of tourist attractions gets chased off. Allegedly there have been more than a few disappearances and even murders of those who were stubborn and refused to leave.