Self-defense motivated Richard P. Silva III to shoot two men, one a childhood friend, at Kipapa Park on the Fourth of July last year, his lawyer told a state jury in opening statements Monday.
Silva, 44, is on trial for first-degree attempted murder, two counts of second-degree attempted murder, using a firearm to commit the crimes, being a felon in possession of a firearm and carrying a firearm without a permit.
Silva and two friends went to The Shack Mililani the night before the shooting and ran into David Kahanu, an old rival of Silva’s, state Public Defender Jack Tonaki said.
Silva and Kahanu had had a grudge against each other since they were in high school in Mililani, and Kahanu had beaten Silva in 1992, said Deputy Prosecutor Rodney Veary.
Nearly 20 years later, Silvia challenged Kahanu to a fight during a fundraiser at the sports bar, but Kahanu declined rather than disrupt the event, said Veary.
At the end of the evening, Tonaki said, Kahanu, along with a group of 20 friends, prevented Silva from leaving, with some of them threatening to "finish this guy."
William Peters, a friend of both men, prevented the fight, Veary said. Silva drove off, stopped two blocks away, changed his clothes, put on a black cap and black gloves and returned to the parking lot outside the bar, he said.
Revving the engine of his Toyota Corolla, he challenged Kahanu to meet him at nearby Kipapa Park, Veary said.
Peters and Chadwick Ceno, who had been a friend of Silva’s since childhood, followed him to the park to try to prevent a fight, Veary said.
A third man, Travis Joaquin, who was on his way home from The Shack, saw Ceno’s truck blocking Silva’s car and went to see what was going on, Veary said.
When Ceno approached Silva, Veary said, Silva shot him in the stomach, then shot Joaquin in the back. With both men on the ground, Veary said, Silva shot Ceno twice more, then walked over to Joaquin and shot him twice more.
He then walked back to Ceno and pulled the trigger twice, but the gun was empty.
Ceno and Joaquin survived.
Kahanu never went to the park.
Tonaki said Silva thought the entire group was coming for him, not just the three who did. He said it was Ceno who brought the gun.
Silva wrestled it away from Ceno, then "started shooting wildly to get these guys away from him," said Tonaki.
Silva then got into his car and drove off, Tonaki said.
When officer Roel Gapusan arrived at the park, he said Peters was pacing and Ceno was on the telephone telling his mother he had been shot. He said both men identified Silva as the assailant.
Silva turned himself in about two hours later.
Veary said a bystander found a handgun on Kamehameha Highway near the Lanikuhana Avenue intersection later in the day. He said a slug from a test fire matched a slug removed from Joaquin’s wound.
But Tonaki told the jury that Silva dropped the gun at the park.
The gun had been reported stolen years earlier.
The single count of first-degree attempted murder arises from Silva’s alleged attempt to kill more than one person at the same time.
