A Maui police officer who cited state Rep. Kaniela Ing in January for failure to have no-fault insurance on his car is disputing Ing’s claim that Ing wasn’t driving the vehicle before he was cited, according to a Maui representative of the police union.

Ing turned himself in to police last week and was arrested on a bench warrant that was issued in February after he failed to appear in court to answer the insurance citation. Ing said he was unaware he had missed his court date, and was in Honolulu on business the day his case came up in Maui District Court. He paid $250 bail and was released.

Ing said his car had been vandalized in January while it was parked on the street in front of his South Kihei home, and he had canceled the insurance on the damaged vehicle.

Ing said he was attempting to fix the car on the street in front of his house Jan. 20 when a police officer approached him. The officer asked for proof of insurance for the vehicle, and cited Ing because the insurance had expired, he said.

Ing said last week he plans to dispute the no-fault ticket because he wasn’t driving the vehicle in question when he got the ticket, and because he had no-fault coverage on another vehicle.

“I kind of wanted to dispute it because: A, I wasn’t driving, and B, I had insurance, just for a different car,” Ing said. “I understand that’s the law, but it was like on the side of my house, and my car was out of commission, so it was undrivable.”

He added that “I think we have an infallible case.”

Barry Aoki, chairman of the Maui chapter of the State of Hawaii Organization of Police Officers, said the officer who cited Ing contacted the police union after reading news accounts of the case.

The officer said that “what Kaniela is quoted as saying happened is not correct, so the officer is upset and disappointed,” Aoki said. “They are looking forward to going to court on it.”

Aoki also said Ing was cited under a section of law that requires that the motorist be operating a vehicle on a roadway in order to be cited.

“Just sitting in a parked car is not operating the vehicle,” Aoki said. “Just because a car is parked on the roadway doesn’t mean that it needs to have insurance, because the officer has got to witness it being operated on the roadway.”

Aoki said he could not provide any additional details about the citation. State records list the Maui officer who issued the citation as Carlos Frate, but Frate was unavailable for comment.

Ing changed his story Monday. “I was cited about, I think, one street away or two streets away from my house,” he said.

When asked again if he was driving the vehicle, Ing said, “I’m sticking to my original statement. This is a story on the details of a traffic violation. It’s a disputed ticket, which by (its) nature means that my statement is not consistent with the police statement … which is the definition of a disputed charge.”

Ing, who is involved in a Democratic primary race, said it appears his political opponents are trying to use the bench warrant to influence the outcome of the Aug. 13 primary election.

He is being challenged by Deidre Tegarden for the District 11 House seat representing South Maui. Tegarden served as chief of protocol under Govs. Neil Abercrombie and David Ige before leaving to seek the South Maui seat occupied by Ing since 2012.

Ing issued a statement last week saying, “I deeply apologize for missing the notice and court date while on Oahu for legislative work. I will accept full responsibility for whatever outcome transpires, and apologize to my constituents for any embarrassment I have caused. This was a stupid mistake, it was a human mistake, and a lesson has been learned.”

His next court date in the case is Aug. 25.