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Hawaii News

Marsland family trust gives $1M to Shriners

A trust set up by the parents of the late former city Prosecutor Charles Marsland Jr. has donated an additional $1 million to Shriners Hospital for Children in Honolulu.

The total amount from the trust to the Shriners Hospital is now $3 million, said trustee Eugene Drzymala.

The amount is the largest donation to the Shriners in Honolulu from a single donor, according to the Shriners organization.

"The Marsland family was deeply involved in the Shriners cause for generations," Drzymala said.

Marsland, a tough and outspoken crime fighter, started working for city prosecutors after his only child, son Charles Marsland III, was murdered in 1975.

He later served eight years as city prosecutor after winning elections for four-year terms in 1980 and 1984.

He died at his Hawaii Kai home on his 84th birthday in 2007.

The former prosecutor provided some money, but the bulk of the donation came from the trust of parents Charles and Sadie Marsland, Drzymala said.

Drzymala said the former prosecutor was a "very, very fiscally conservative person."

"He never was into money," Drzymala said.

The former prosecutor and his father were Shriners, and his mother was a member of the Eastern Star, a charitable fraternal organization, according to Drzymala.

"The entire family was deeply moved by the compassion and generosity of the Shriners, which made them decide that their entire life’s work would be contributed to the Shriners to better help them serve the children of the world," Drzymala said.

Stan Berry, Shriners Hospital administrator, expressed appreciation for the donation, saying it will have "far-reaching and long-term effects for medical care, continuing education and research."

Drzymala said the remainder of the parents’ trust will be donated later. He said the amount has yet to be determined.

Shriners Hospitals operates 22 advanced pediatric hospitals in the world. They provide care to children under age 18 regardless of the families’ ability to pay.

 

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