Car dealership sues Honolulu firm renting parking spaces

It’s not often a dispute over street parking in Kakaako involves a luxury car dealership, a German city, a wartime confiscation of private property and two brothers with a knack for buying up land of questionable ownership.

Well, buckle your seat belt, because here’s that story.

The owner of BMW of ­Honolulu filed a lawsuit last week in state Circuit Court contesting the ownership of the street immediately behind the car dealership at 777 Kapiolani Blvd.

Shelly Eurocars LLC alleges a winding history of ownership for the roughly block-long section of Waimanu Street that a company led by brothers Calvert and Cedric Chun, Kakaako Land Co., claims to have bought about a year ago from a German municipality.

Since then Kakaako Land has posted reserved-parking signs, rented out stalls and towed away unauthorized vehicles in the area that BMW Honolulu has used for employee and customer parking since opening its luxury car dealership in 2000.

BMW Honolulu contends that the Chuns don’t own the street because the U.S. government confiscated the property during World War II.

The Chuns “had no right to lease parking stalls on the Ewa portion of Waimanu Street or to otherwise interfere with parking on that portion of the street,” says the lawsuit, which was filed by law firm Bendet Fidell Sugimura on behalf of Shelly Eurocars and affiliates Shelton Properties and Shelton Investments.

About 20 parking stalls are in back of the dealership, and they are rented by a neighboring gym, Kakaako Fitness, that opened at about the same time Kakaako Land filed a deed with the state in August 2015 showing its ownership of the street.

The lawsuit says BMW Honolulu objected to Kakaako Land reserving the parking in September 2015 but that Kakaako Land posted parking signs and caused vehicles belonging to or in the custody of Shelly Eurocars to be towed away.

Recently, Kakaako Land informed BMW Honolulu that it intends to temporarily close the street in back of the dealership for a private event that would block three driveways to dealership property.

A facilities manager with BMW Honolulu said no one was available to comment for this story. Kakaako Land company representatives did not respond to a request for comment.

BMW Honolulu is not the first company to challenge Kakaako Land in court.

In 2014 seven small businesses including Queen Auto LLC, Tropical Lamp &Shade Co. and U. Okada Co. sued Kakaako Land over road ownership. They argue that the original owner of the roads, a man named Charles S. Desky who subdivided much of Kakaako more than 100 years ago, abandoned his interest after five years of no ownership acts; that the streets were automatically dedicated to the public when Desky sold subdivided lots; and that others obtained the land through “adverse possession” by consistently occupying the space.

The 2014 lawsuit also contends that Desky dedicated the streets to the Territory of Hawaii, as evidenced by a 1903 joint territorial House and Senate resolution directing the superintendent of public works to accept a deed for eight streets from a willing Desky at no charge. However, there is no evidence a deed was ever conveyed to the territory.

Kakaako Land acquired a quitclaim deed to the streets in 1985 from Desky’s sole remaining heir for $5,000 plus returns equal to 25 percent of rental income from the property.

The Legislature this year passed a law that retroactively states the 1903 resolution was enough to convey ownership of the streets to the state. However, implementing the law has proved problematic.

Meanwhile the City Council is considering a resolution to condemn portions of Waimanu, Queen, Kawaiahao, Ilaniwai, Curtis, Dreier, Cummins and Kamakee streets.

The new lawsuit reveals that tracing landownership and the chain of title might not be as simple as the Legislature surmised when it passed the recent law.

BMW Honolulu claims in its suit that the Ewa portion of Waimanu Street was conveyed through foreclosure from Desky to another person, H. Wilhelm Wolters, in 1905.

After Wolters died in 1918, his interest in the street went to a trust that benefited the German town of Bremen, the lawsuit says.

Then, in 1944, the U.S. Department of Justice confiscated the U.S. holdings of Bremen, including the interest in Waimanu Street, the complaint said. Though the lawsuit said no conveyance of Waimanu Street involving the U.S. government was ever recorded, BMW Honolulu suggests the federal government owns the Ewa end of the street.

The municipality of Bremen, however, was willing to sell the roughly block-long stretch of Waimanu Street to Calvert Chun last year for $7,000.

“Freie Hansestadt Bremen, the City Municipality of Bremen, Germany, acknowledges that to the best of its belief, it is the sole residuary beneficiary of the estate of H. Wilhelm Wolters,” states the quitclaim deed signed by Bremen official Maren John.

A quitclaim deed isn’t uncommon for Hawaii property transactions, but offers no warranties against other ownership interests in a property already existing.