Honolulu Record, August 19, 1948, vol. 1 no. 3, p. 1
Official transcript of the Reinecke hearing is so full of errors of ommission and commission that without proper corrections it is absolutely useless as a true and substantial record of the hearing now in its third week before the Commissioners of Public Instruction.
This was stated by Richard Gladstein, attorney for Dr. and Mrs. John Reinecke, this (Tuesday) morning after he had spent all day yesterday checking the transcript of the court reporter as against the recording made on wire spools.
Before Ichiro Izuka, self-tyled [sic] ex-Communist, took the witness stand to answer direct questioning, Mr. Gladstein requested of the school board and the Attorney General a duplicate set of wire recordings of Louis F. Budenz's and Dr. W. Harold Loper's testimonies. He also asked that the official transcript of the hearing taken down by the court reporter be checked against the wire recording before it is entered as a permanent record.
Numerous Errors
Mr. Gladstein explained that when he received the transcript Sunday evening, he "leafed through it and found to my amazement the incredible number of errors it contained."
Not only were mistakes limited to punctuations, spelling and grammar but questions and answers were twisted around, ommissions were made and all this contributed to changing the meaning of what was asked and answered in the courtroom. The defense attorney said he checked with the court reporter who informed that she herself did not correct the transcript but that several employees at the Attorney General's office had played back the recordings and made the corrections.
"This is a grievious [sic] and distressing situation," Mr. Gladstein said. "I am not accusing anyone." But Mr. Gladstein added, if after such a check-up has been made of the transcript and major errors still remain, the Reineckes will not get a fair hearing
Tried Hard
Attorney General Ackerman answered that this is one of the most accurate transcript even made. He had combed the Territory for the best court reporters and had bent over backwards to produce faithful record.
"With a representative from the attorney general's office, Mr. Gladstein had gone over 80 pages of Louis Budenz's cross-examination. This took seven hours. There were 195 "sufficiently serious mistakes."
The 80 pages were only part of the 290-page transcript of Mr. Budenz's testimony during cross-examination.
Not For "Propaganda"
When Mr. Gladstein requested duplicates of the wire recordings, Attorney General Walter D. Ackerman Jr., said he had no objection excepting for the fact that he did not want them to be used for propaganda purposes. He objected to these recordings being played to laborers at such places as parks.
Throughout last week the Attorney General strongly objected to turning over the transcript to the defense attorneys and to the Reineckes. Today, after a surprising disclosure of the inaccuracies and ommissions in the transcripts by Mr. Gladstein, Mr. Ackerman defended his office which he said had tried its best to produce a faithful transcript.
Delegate Involved
Mr. Izuka after taking the stand this morning continued to disclose names of alleged communist leaders in Hawaii. He spoke of the various. Communist meetings he claims to have attended. He explained that he resigned from the Communist Party because he disagreed, with others on the choice for the delegate to congress.
Mr. Gladstein objected to "hearsay" testimony when Mr. Izuka began testifying on alleged Communist activities after his "resignation" from the Party. The defense attorney in his objection stated that this type of testimony had no bearing on the Reineckes and that it was part of a move on Governor Stainback's and the Attorney General's part to wash their "political linen" in the courtroom.