Maui Chief Pelletier, former Las Vegas police captain named in Diddy lawsuit, won't be placed on leave

Akiya Dillon, Las Vegas Review-Journal on Mar 21, 2025

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Maui’s police chief, John Pelletier, who formerly worked as a Las Vegas officer and was recently named a “co-conspirator” in a federal lawsuit against Sean “Diddy” Combs, will not be placed on administrative leave, per a 7-0 vote held by the county’s police commission.

Pelletier served in the Metropolitan Police Department for 22 years, rising to the rank of captain, before he left and took a job in 2021 as chief of the Maui Police Department in Hawaii. The lawsuit, filed by California resident Ashley Parham and two anonymous plaintiffs on March 7, suggests he helped to cover up a 2018 California sexual assault and kidnapped two witnesses.

A week later, Pelletier responded to the allegations via an emailed statement from the police department, saying that he has never visited the city nor county where the first of two alleged incidents is to have occurred.

A Wednesday meeting came after Maui County Mayor Richard Bissen’s request that the county’s police commission put Pelletier on leave, citing “concerns regarding public trust” in a letter to the commission. Still, several residents defended Pelletier during the meeting.

Maui’s County Clerk Moana Lutey said there was no precedent for placing a police chief on “any type of leave” pending civil litigation.

“Civil complaints require very little. There is no investigation typically done. They are just allegations and not much more,” Lutey said.

Lutey urged the commission to “not buckle to public or political pressures to place the chief on leave.”

Several residents defended the chief during the meeting.

“He has been slandered all over the national news when they don’t even have the facts or hardcore evidence against him,” resident Patricia Hunt said. “People never forget when you’re falsely accused of a crime this heinous.”

Keola Whittaker, Pelletier’s lawyer, questioned the lawsuit’s merit.

“In short, it does not meet the legal requirements to move forward,” Whittaker said. “Two of the plaintiffs in this case were not identified by name. That is a very serious issue. Before filing a lawsuit like that, you need to get permission to do that.”

Whittaker also said that because lawyers did not get permission to do that, the complaint was not active at the time of the meeting.

“No approval means no case. No case means no summons. No summons means no defendant, which means that this man is not in an active civil complaint right now,” Whittaker said, motioning at Pelletier, who sat shoulder to shoulder with him.

“Right now, this lawsuit isn’t just stalled. It’s stuck at the starting gate,” Whittaker said. “At this stage, it has as much legal weight as a blog post or TikTok video, seriously.”

Whitaker said he did not know why the chief was named and called it “a case of mistaken identity.”

Commissioners decided not to take action against Pelletier. Instead, they expressed frustration over how the media and public had found out about the allegations before they did.

“I just feel like this guy has been judged by so many people. Everybody is on social media,” said commissioner Bill Richardson. “In my mind, this is an easy decision.”

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