An Oahu grand jury indicted a 46-year-old Waipahu man Tuesday on charges of second-degree attempted murder and second-degree assault for allegedly running over a woman pushing her baby in a stroller in the Mililani Walmart parking lot and then attacking her and a man who tried to intervene last week.
Desmond Kekahuna is in custody at the Oahu Community Correctional Center on $1 million bail in what appears to be a random attack. The charge of attempted murder carries a mandatory life sentence with the possibility of parole.
Around 9 a.m. Feb. 1, Kekahuna drove his red Honda Fit into the Walmart parking lot, accelerated and made a hard left turn into another aisle when he hit 37-year-old Kristelle Taliulu, according to a prosecutor’s bail form. She was pushing her 6-month-old in a stroller, but the child was unharmed. Kekahuna didn’t stop, hitting two cars and dragging Taliulu about
15 feet, where she came to rest by the front driver’s-side tire.
Forty-year-old Zachariah Jones came to help, but Kekahuna, in a blue Patriots shirt, exited the vehicle and struck him some 20 times on the head, arms and body with a 12-inch-long tire iron, the bail form said. Taliulu’s legs were broken and bleeding, the bones sticking out, a witness told police. Kekahuna swung at and missed another witness who tried to intervene. He then attacked Taliula with the tire iron. A witness said Kekahuna “kept going between” the two “and wouldn’t let anyone near them,” the bail form said.
After more bystanders confronted Kekahuna, he returned the tire iron to his car, fetched a cigarette and sat down on the curb, according to the form. Jones suffered an “open gash” on his arm, the form said.
When police confronted Kekahuna, he allegedly put up his fists and attempted to strike an officer but missed. The officer was joined by
another, who attempted to arrest Kekahuna as he resisted. After a struggle, the officers said, they handcuffed him.
Honolulu Emergency Medical Services brought Taliulu and Jones to a hospital.
A GoFundMe campaign for Taliulu has already raised more than $18,000 from more than 300 donors.
“This senseless crime against unsuspecting victims horrifies us all,” said Prosecuting Attorney Steve Alm in a news release. “Our thoughts are with those who were injured. We intend to prosecute the perpetrator to the fullest extent of the law,” Alm said.
Kekahuna’s criminal history dates back more than two decades, but most recently county prosecutors cited him for criminal harassment in September. He missed a court appearance the next month, after which a judge issued a warrant for his arrest.
The alleged harassment occurred at the Jack Hall subsidized housing project in Waipahu, where Kekahuna, who had no monthly income and paid no rent, resided in a two-bedroom apartment, according to court documents.
The property management company accused Kekahuna of threatening a relative of the resident manager with a bat and threatening another tenant whose sliding glass door was later damaged by a rock, according to a lawyer for the property manager as it sought to evict him in
September.
The same day Kekahuna was evicted on Nov. 1 by court order, the Attorney General Department’s Child Support Enforcement Agency notified him that he must pay $166 a month in child support as the “responsible parent” for two teenage children.
The state had requested that the court mandate anger management and a substance abuse assessment after Kekahuna was charged with felony first-degree terroristic threatening in 1999. Kekahuna pleaded no
contest and received a
sentence of five years’
probation.
In 1996, Kekahuna was charged with second-degree criminal trespassing, but his case was dismissed.
