Hawaii Prison Warden Reinstated After Being Fired in 2014 for Sexual Harassment
by Michael Thompson
On September 17, 2025, the Hawai’i State Supreme Court affirmed a ruling allowing a warden who was fired in 2014 over a litany of accusations, including sexual harassment, to be reinstated. The warden’s reversal of fortune became quite literal as the state is now required to cover over a decade’s worth of lost wages totaling more than a million dollars.
Warden Ruth Collar Forbes was tasked by the Hawai’i Department of Public Safety (“DPS”) to reopen the Kulani prison on Hawai’i Island that had been closed for four years. Forbes was first employed as a prison guard in 1995 and worked her way up to warden. The state’s Supreme Court noted she maintained a clean disciplinary record up until her assignment to Kulani. However, in 2014, an employee at Kulani submitted a letter of resignation that cited a “threatening and hostile work environment.” That employee later submitted a formal complaint against Forbes for a series of incidents over a year.
Forty-three charges were levied against Forbes. Of those, 37 were initially found to be valid by a hearing officer. Yet another was partially substantiated. Among the egregious and substantiated charges included the warden grabbing an employee’s penis against the employee’s wishes and referring to a Black employee as “Monkey,” “Planet of the Apes,” and “That black bastard.” One of the substantiated charges, number 25, had a zero-tolerance provision. The sexual harassment charge allowed dismissal but did not require it.
Forbes appealed to the Merit Appeals Board. Their review found that 21 of the charges were substantiated but disagreed with the DPS hearings officer on the remainder, which included the zero-tolerance charge. The board then concluded that dismissal was too severe a punishment, despite the substantiated sexual harassment charge. Part of the decision was supported simply because her job was hard and “would have been complicated for a Warden with experience.”
The DPS appealed and the circuit court reversed the MAB’s decision. The MAB “acted in excess of its statutory authority because its decision to modify the discharge decision ‘based on the principle of progressive discipline’ improperly impinged upon the policies promulgated under the state director of human resources development, contrary to the legislative purpose of HRS § 76-47(c).” Forbes appealed to the Intermediate Court of Appeals (ICA), which confirmed the MAB had overstepped.
When Forbes appealed to the state Supreme Court, however, it granted a Writ of Certiorari and subsequently granted her a reversal. The progressive discipline policy associated with charge number 2 allowed the MAB to consider punishment other than dismissal, so the appellate courts had erroneously applied the zero-tolerance policy that only applied to dismissed charge number 25.
In the end, a person in a position of power committed a series of infractions, including the undesired grabbing of a coworker’s penis, and many of those infractions were recorded by the people reporting to her. But because her job was difficult, she had an unblemished work history, and was getting a divorce, the MAB ignored the severity of the charges and overrode the Department of Public Safety. And the state of Hawai’i is out 1 million dollars. See: State of Hawai’i v. Forbes and Merit Appeals Board, SCWC-18-0000216 (2025).
Additional source: Honolulu Civil Beat
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Related legal case
State of Hawai’i v. Forbes and Merit Appeals Board,
| Year | 2025 |
|---|---|
| Cite | SCWC-18-0000216 (2025) |
| Level | Court of Appeals |