A 25-year-old man accused of killing one of his passengers in a drunken driving crash near Keaau Beach Park had two prior DUI cases against him dismissed because the prosecutor wasn’t ready when the cases came up for trial, according to state court records.

An Oahu grand jury returned an indictment last month charging Puletua Wilson of Waianae, a former quarterback for Waianae High School’s football team, with manslaughter in the Oct. 15, 2017, death of 20- year-old Troy Kahooilihala.

Wilson posted $100,00 bail and pleaded not guilty. His trial is scheduled for next month.

Deputy Prosecutor Ashley Tanaka told state Circuit Judge Shirley Kawamura that Wilson had been drinking with friends and that as everyone was getting ready to leave, he jumped behind the wheel of a friend’s car. Despite efforts to stop him, Wilson drove off with two passengers, including Kahooilihala, who was in the back seat.

Tanaka said Wilson’s friends followed in another vehicle and saw Wilson speeding and driving erratically. The friends told police that while they were speaking to a 911 operator, Wilson’s vehicle disappeared from view. They later found it on the beach along Farrington Highway.

Honolulu police said the car veered off the roadway, tore through a chain-link fence, struck a pickup truck parked near the beach, then went airborne and rolled over several times before coming to a rest.

Kahooilihala was thrown from the vehicle and pronounced dead at the scene.

Tanaka said Wilson’s blood alcohol concentration measured 0.17 two hours after the crash. The legal threshold for drunken driving is 0.08 BAC. She also said according to the air bag sensor, the car’s speed was 78 mph just before impact.

Police had arrested Wilson in January 2013 at the Waianae Boat Harbor for operating a moped while drunk. He had called police at about 2 a.m. and flagged down officers to report that someone in the parking lot had a gun.

As the officers were conducting their investigation, police said, Wilson sped through the parking lot on a moped with its headlight off, nearly hitting one of the officers. They said Wilson’s speech was slurred and that he smelled of alcohol but refused to be tested for alcohol intoxication.

Eight months later, after his driver’s license had been revoked for two years, police stopped him as he was driving a car on Farrington Highway in Makaha. A Breathalyzer measured Wilson’s BAC at 0.142.

According to the police report, Wilson said, “Honestly, officer, I don’t need this s—- right now. All I want to do is go home and sleep.”

The first DUI was scheduled for trial on Dec. 4, 2013. The judge rescheduled it for Jan. 22, 2014, because the state wasn’t ready. When the prosecutor told the court the state still wasn’t ready because two officers involved in the case were no longer with the Honolulu Police Department, Judge Alvin Nishimura dismissed the case.

The second DUI was scheduled for trial on Dec. 20, 2013. The judge rescheduled it to Feb. 5, 2014, because Wilson didn’t have a lawyer and the prosecutor was not ready. The trial was rescheduled again to March 19, 2014, because two officers were not available. Judge Randal Shintani dismissed the case on the third trial date because one officer was injured, another was sick and a third had retired.

The state refiled the second DUI case in April 2014, but that too was dismissed on Aug. 30, 2017, one month and six days before Kahooilihala’s death, because Wilson was never served a summons.