Body in park prompts probe
Hawaii County police opened an investigation after a body was found Thursday in a West Hawaii park.
Firefighters directed officers to a partially decomposed body in an area of heavy vegetation at Higashihara Park in Keauhou Mauka at 5:50 p.m., police said.
Police said they could not immediately determine the age, gender or identity of the body. An autopsy is pending.
Police sued over shooting
A man sued the Maui Police Department and others Tuesday, claiming officers used excessive force when they shot at a truck he was in two years ago, the Maui News reported.
Anthony Lum-John, 19, was shot in the buttock, and the bullet cannot be removed, the lawsuit says.
On July 18, 2010, Lum-John was riding in the back of a pickup truck that, according to the lawsuit, was going to a hospital with a man injured in a fight at Punalau Beach.
The truck encountered police officers making a traffic stop on another vehicle. Officer Erik Losvar stepped onto the roadway and was grazed by the passing truck, the lawsuit says.
Police officers fired 15 rounds at the truck, the lawsuit says.
Lum-John was shot in the buttock, and Joshua Nakagawa, the injured man being taken to the hospital, was shot three times, says a lawsuit filed by Nakagawa last year. Both were sitting in the truck bed.
The county said police used appropriate force to protect themselves after the truck slowed, then accelerated and hit Losvar.
Named as defendants are the county, the Police Department and officers Losvar, Jun Hattori, Russell Kapahulehua and Harry Matsuura.
The driver of the truck, Austin Pierman, was charged with attempted murder.
