Martin Kao, a former Hawaii defense contractor who bilked the federal government out of nearly $13 million in pandemic relief aid and funneled nearly $200,000 in illegal campaign contributions to Republican U.S. Sen. Susan Collins will be allowed to attend Harvard while he awaits sentencing in three separate court cases. 

U.S. District Court Judge Leslie Kobayashi approved an order this week that allows Kao to travel to Cambridge, Massachusetts, to attend classes for the fall semester. 

In court papers, Kao’s attorney, Victor Bakke, argued that letting his client leave Hawaii for the East Coast would allow him to “engage in higher education and activities that provide rehabilitation, sense of purpose, self-refinement, and dignity to his life given the destruction he has done to his own worth.” 

The motion was unopposed by the U.S. attorneys prosecuting Kao. 

Kao’s legal troubles began in 2020 when he was arrested and charged for defrauding the U.S. Small Business Administration’s Paycheck Protect Program out of $12.8 million. 

In 2022, he and two executives from his company, formerly known as Navatek LLC, were then indicted for making a series of illegal campaign contributions to Collins and a super PAC that was supporting her after she helped secure funding for an $8 million federal contract that went to the company.

Kao was charged in a separate criminal case in 2023 for bank fraud for falsifying documents while trying to obtain a $3 million loan to buy a $4.5 million home in Kahala on Oahu. 

He has pleaded guilty in all three cases and is awaiting sentencing, which is currently scheduled for October.