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Police say civilian crashed into cruiser in Nanakuli

The Nanakuli crash involving a police vehicle and a civilian car, whose driver was seriously injured Wednesday, remains under investigation, the Honolulu Police Department said today.

HPD said the account of events shared with the media Wednesday was taken from initial witness accounts and evidence.

In that account, police said the officer was traveling west on Farrington Highway to a service call with his blue light and siren activated “while waiting at the intersection to make a U-turn.”

“The male civilian driver was driving mauka to makai and struck the officer’s vehicle,” HPD said.

The crash occurred at about 2 p.m. Wednesday in the area of Farrington Highway and Princess Kahanu Avenue.

However, a person who said he witnessed the crash wrote on a Facebook page that the officer was at fault.

“The guy in the Honda Civic was turning east out of Princess Kahanu, not speeding, driving normal,” the man said. “We could hear faint sirens, but we couldn’t tell where it was coming from. As the driver tried to pull out on to the road, the cop full on slammed into the Civic.

“The cop didn’t slow down to even check if someone was turning out. He was speeding at a rate to where his car almost did a full 360 turn.”

He said the officer jumped out and checked his car first before he ran to the Civic.

People pulled to the middle of the road and immediately stopped to help the man out of the car.

Numerous photos of damage to the cars have been posted on Facebook of the blue-and-white police car with front-end damage and the more seriously damaged Honda Civic with major front-end damage.

Police shut down eastbound lanes of Farrington Highway by Princess Kahanu Avenue for five and a half hours.

Emergency Medical Services treated the 22-year-old driver who was in serious condition. The officer was not injured.

HPD’s Vehicular Homicide Section responded to the accident, but have not released a public report on HPD’s website.

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