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Bruce Asato / basato@staradvertiser.com
Friends consoled each other Monday on the side of Pali Highway near the trail to Kapena Falls
The Honolulu Medical Examiner’s Office identified the 17-year-old boy who died on a Labor Day outing with friends at Kapena Falls as Leighton Mow, of Honolulu.
Mow was a senior at Moanalua High School, said Moanalua principal Robin Martin.
Campus counselors are available for students and friends of Mow, who attended Moanalua for three years and had older siblings who graduated from the school, Martin said.
Mow had been with a group of nine to 10 friends who arrived at Kapena Falls, off the Pali Highway in Nuuanu, sometime after 9 a.m. Monday, a fire official said.
The teenager told friends he was going to the restroom, and they began to worry when they were unable to locate him at about 10:30 a.m. The friends conducted a search and called the boy’s parents, who went to Kapena Falls. The Honolulu Fire Department was called at 2:15 p.m., fire officials said.
Fire rescue divers found the teen’s body at the bottom of the pond at about 3 p.m.
Officials said the visibility at the pond was murky, with rain clouds covering the inland area of Nuuanu Valley.
Witnesses said they didn’t know whether the boy slipped, fell, or jumped into the water, Bowers said.
An autopsy was to be conducted Tuesday to determine cause of death, the Medical Examiner’s Office said.
In 2009, a 32-year-old man died after jumping about 10 feet into the pool at Kapena Falls.
