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Honolulu police are searching for two possible suspects in connection with an officer-involved shooting Wednesday morning in Pearl City. A 23-year-old male was arrested later that afternoon.
The incident started in Waiau at about 5:50 a.m. when an officer stopped a vehicle for excessive speeding, police Chief Susan Ballard said.
“When the suspect vehicle came to a stop, the officer got out of his car. The suspect vehicle immediately accelerated towards the officer, narrowly missing him,” Ballard said in a news conference. “Fearing for his life, the officer discharged his firearm.”
Police have opened a first-degree attempted murder investigation into the incident, which happened at Kaluamoi Place.
Ballard said the officer has 13 years of service and, per standard procedure, was offered three days of administrative leave.
The investigation involves a four-door, tan-colored sedan, which was abandoned on Kaonohi Street on the corner of the Macy’s side entrance of Pearlridge Center in Aiea. The vehicle had a shattered window on the driver’s side and blood inside. A witness saw two suspects flee the area on foot.
Police cordoned the area with yellow police tape and temporarily shut down the mauka-bound lanes of Kaonohi Street near the shopping mall as detectives investigated.
The investigation also prompted lockdowns at Pearl Ridge Elementary School, Our Savior Lutheran School and a preschool run by Kamaaina Kids at St. Timothy Episcopal Church as precautionary measures.
The lockdowns were lifted by 9:30 a.m., and affected lanes on Kaonohi Street were reopened at 9:55 a.m.
Pearl City Neighborhood Board member Lorna May Pacheco, who said she wasn’t entirely familiar with the situation, mentioned crimes such as the armed man who barricaded himself in Pacific Palisades in September are “prevalent” in the area. She said a lack of police presence may be a contributing factor.
“We’re short (on) police officers,” she said. “Personally, I’ve called and had nobody come up.”
Pacheco said she had called about a man in front of her house who was lying on the street in the middle of the night and later learned that he had been run over.
Ballard said the incident was random, calling it “a crime of opportunity.”
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