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Mixed martial arts champion Ilima-Lei Macfarlane and her sister, Mahina, are among three former Punahou School basketball players who allege sexual abuse in a civil lawsuit filed Wednesday against former Punahou coach Dwayne Yuen and the school. The third student is listed as Jane Doe.
The 60-page complaint details allegations of years of manipulation and sexual abuse, including rape of Jane Doe, and negligence and condoning by other coaches and administrators.
The complaint says Yuen, an assistant coach, who was in his mid-30s at the time, “was a sexual predator who targeted and sexually groomed underage female students attending Punahou School.”
Sexual grooming is when a child is taught to trust an adult and the adult uses this to create an inappropriate relationship.
The allegations go back to the 2003-2004 school year, when the Macfarlane sisters were 12 and 14 years old.
“I think that (Yuen) needs to face the consequences for the lives that he’s destroyed, for all the other victims,” said Ilima-Lei Macfarlane, in an interview with the Honolulu Star-Advertiser on Wednesday. She also said the school should be held accountable.
Mahina Macfarlane reported the coach to Punahou officials in 2005, and Ilima-Lei Macfarlane did so soon after, according to the court filing. The complaint claims the school did nothing to protect them and other female basketball players.
At least two other women who played basketball at Punahou when Yuen was there complained of sexual abuse when they were at the school. Those allegations led to Yuen losing his job as a second-grade teacher at Momilani Elementary School, a public school, in 2018. He also left his position with a girls club basketball team at that time. Punahou said at the time it was investigating the cases.
A call to Yuen’s cellphone Wednesday was referred to his work email address. He did not respond to an email and text message.
The complaint asks for
a jury trial and an unspecified amount in damages from defendants Yuen and Punahou, and potentially others. The lawsuit was filed by the law offices of Vladimir P. Devens.
Punahou director of communications Robert Gelber provided the following statement:
“We are deeply troubled by reports of sexual abuse raised by three former students. The reports allege abuse from 2004-2005 by Dwayne Yuen, a former girls basketball coach at our school. We are currently investigating these reports and are committed to working with the survivors to find resolution and healing.
“In no uncertain terms, Punahou stands with survivors of sexual abuse everywhere, and we respect the courage it takes to report these incidents.
“Providing for the physical, mental and emotional safety of our students is our highest priority at Punahou. We hold ourselves to the highest ideals and are committed to reckoning with the past and bringing issues out of the shadows so that we can resolve them and provide counseling and support to survivors.”
Punahou officials sent a letter to parents and other members of its community earlier this week, acknowledging sexual abuse allegations. A similar letter was sent in 2018.
The lawsuit says these letters, the one this week describing the allegations as “recent,” are too little, too late.
The lawsuit includes what it says are verbatim text messages that Yuen sent to Jane Doe, after he’d allegedly raped her and she was still in high school. They include threats of humiliating her at school and at basketball practice and threats of physically hurting her. There is also an allegation of a verbal death threat. Jane Doe’s mother obtained a temporary restraining order against the coach.
Ilima-Lei Macfarlane said she met Yuen when she was in sixth grade, and he was later her intermediate school team coach. The complaint states that Yuen gave her special treatment like he did with Mahina.
“Basically there was definitely some misconduct,” she said. “There were very inappropriate relationships between young girls and a grown man. And he wasn’t just a grown man but he was my basketball coach and in a position of power,” Ilima- Lei Macfarlane said. “I know that there were other girls. Me and my sister, Mahina, were still in school, and she actually ended up being the first one to report it, to the police and to the school.”
“I was also a witness to her abuse, but nobody ever questioned me. There was no investigation. They swept it under the rug and ignored us, especially Punahou.
“I’m not too sure what went on with the police investigation. I know Punahou for sure ignored it and swept it under the rug,” she said. “He (Yuen) was still allowed to be on campus and to coach basketball. He really messed up our reputations and our love for basketball. It’s why I stopped playing
basketball.”
In the complaint, Ilima-Lei Macfarlane is quoted as saying the coach “messed up her mind,” and despite her success in MMA, she still struggles psychologically and emotionally — as have the other women, according to the complaint.
“I felt ostracized from the program and the team,” she added.
Ilima-Lei Macfarlane, 30, took up MMA after college at San Diego State. She is the inaugural and reigning flyweight world champion of Bellator MMA promotion, a subsidiary of ViacomCBS and a leading mixed martial arts organization. Her record is 11-0.
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