Former officer receives 60 days in $75,000 theft

A former police lieutenant who admitted stealing $75,000 from the Kauai Police Department is going to jail for 60 days.

U.S. District Judge J. Michael Seabright sentenced Karen Kapua to the two-month jail term Monday and is allowing her to serve her sentence three days per week on consecutive weekends starting Jan. 6. He noted that Kapua cares for a special-needs son and her 76-year-old husband, who is recovering from an injury he sustained in an accident.

Seabright also fined Kapua $25,000 but did not order her to pay restitution because she had already repaid the money she stole when she pleaded guilty in July.

Kapua, 54, pleaded guilty to one count of theft for stealing $25,000 from KPD in December 2014. In exchange for her guilty plea, the federal prosecutor agreed to drop one money laundering charge and two other theft charges for stealing the other $50,000 in December 2013 and June 2014.

At the time she stole the money, Kapua, a former KPD Officer of the Year, was commander of the department’s vice section. The money was supposed to be used by KPD to make undercover drug buys. At least some of it came from the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency in the form of grants to help eradicate marijuana.

Defense lawyer Brook Hart told Seabright that Kapua committed the thefts following a series of devastating events starting with the death of her teenage daughter in a drunken-driving car crash in September 2011, followed shortly by the deaths of her mother and stepfather. He said Kapua was also suffering from medical and physical ailments.

“She was not in her right mind,” Hart said.

Kapua told Seabright that her husband, retired KPD officer Irvil Kapua, was also devastated by the death of their daughter and contemplated suicide. So when two of their sons got into drugs, partying and spending extravagantly using her credit card, including trips to Las Vegas, she stole the money to pay off the bills rather than tell her husband about it. She said she intended to pay back the money.

The Kapuas received a large cash settlement from Aston Hotels &Resorts last year. The Aston Aloha Beach Hotel allowed the teenagers, including the driver in their daughter’s fatal crash, to drink alcohol just before the accident.

KPD said Kapua last worked for the department Dec. 6. The FBI said Kapua was fired.

Hart said Monday that Kapua will be able to collect a state pension when she turns 55 next year.

Kapua is a 21-year veteran of KPD, the first five as a dispatcher and the last 16 as a police officer.