An 18-year-old Kalihi man appeared Tuesday in Honolulu District Court on charges stemming from a pepper spray attack on a police officer and a separate terroristic threatening incident involving a firearm.
John Ernest Downer Jr. was charged Monday with allegedly assaulting a female police officer by spraying her with pepper spray June 4.
Downer was arrested over the weekend and charged Sunday with first-degree terroristic threatening and firearm violations for allegedly threatening a 22-year-old man with a firearm in a separate case.
While he was in custody, police discovered that he was a suspect in the pepper spray case, police said.
His bail was set at $100,000.
Crash victim was from China
The Maui Police Department has identified a tourist who died in a car crash as a 75-year-old man from China’s Chengdu province.
Zhang Zhongming was a passenger in a Nissan Maxima sedan that crashed into an embankment and a large boulder shortly before 12:30 p.m. Thursday. The car failed to make it around a curve while traveling down Haleakala Highway 378 about a half-mile north of Palena Place, Kula.
The vehicle’s five occupants were adults and nationals from China traveling as tourists, according to a news release.
Three rear-seat passengers, including Zhang, were taken to the Maui Memorial Medical Center for treatment of injuries sustained in the crash.
Zhang was pronounced dead at the hospital a short while later, the release said.
The driver, a 72-year-old man, and the front-seat passenger of the car were wearing their seat belts. None of the rear-seat passengers was wearing a seat belt at the time of the crash.
Bridge in Koloa to be replaced
Work will soon begin to replace the wooden pedestrian bridge in Koloa with a prefabricated metal bridge, Kauai County officials said in a news release Tuesday.
The $250,000 project will begin Monday. It is slated to be finished in January, weather permitting, the release said. The bridge is along the Wailana Bridge on Maluhia Road at the entrance of old Koloa Town.
Contractors of Kaikor Construction Co. will build abutments and install a bridge 90 feet long and 8 feet wide.
