Lahaina man, 76, identified as the 101st fire victim
![PAM BRODERSEN VIA AP / 2011
Paul Kasprzycki working on a lanai project in South Kona. Maui police confirmed the identity of one new victim, Paul Kasprzycki of Lahaina.](https://staradvertiser.wpenginepowered.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/web1_021324-WEB-Paul-Kasprzycki.jpg)
PAM BRODERSEN VIA AP / 2011
Paul Kasprzycki working on a lanai project in South Kona. Maui police confirmed the identity of one new victim, Paul Kasprzycki of Lahaina.
![COURTESY MAUI POLICE DEPARTMENT
Paul Kasprzycki, 76, was identified as the latest victim after his family was notified.](https://staradvertiser.wpenginepowered.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/web1_Kasprzycki-mug.jpg)
COURTESY MAUI POLICE DEPARTMENT
Paul Kasprzycki, 76, was identified as the latest victim after his family was notified.
![PAM BRODERSEN VIA AP / 2011
Paul Kasprzycki working on a lanai project in South Kona. Maui police confirmed the identity of one new victim, Paul Kasprzycki of Lahaina.](https://staradvertiser.wpenginepowered.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/web1_021324-WEB-Paul-Kasprzycki.jpg)
![COURTESY MAUI POLICE DEPARTMENT
Paul Kasprzycki, 76, was identified as the latest victim after his family was notified.](https://staradvertiser.wpenginepowered.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/web1_Kasprzycki-mug.jpg)
Maui police today released the name of a Lahaina resident who had been reported missing as among the 101 confirmed Aug. 8 wildfire fatalities.
Paul Kasprzycki, 76, was identified as the latest victim after his family was notified.
Kasprzycki had been one of three remaining people on the official list of those reported as missing to the Maui Police Department after the Lahaina fire. The two remaining people on the MPD/FBI unaccounted for list are Robert H. Owens and Elmer Lee Stevens.
Maui police said its Cold Case Detail investigators from the Morgue Identification Notification Task Force continues to investigate the remaining cases. Officials said they are “diligently” looking at all available evidence.
Maui police found Paul Kasprzycki’s remains off a side street in an industrial area, Maui police spokesperson Alana Pico said in an email to the Associated Press. They identified him by comparing X-rays taken before and after his death, she said.
A childhood friend said Kasprzycki excelled as a carpenter and woodworker. He did “fantastic” work but mostly to satisfy his own interest, said Steve Brodersen, who knew Kasprzycki from when they were both in the eighth grade.
“He never marched to marketing on any given day,” Brodersen told the AP. He said Kasprzycki set up a small retail shop that doubled as an apartment after his children were grown.
Kasprzycki came to Hawaii while racing a boat he made from Santa Monica, Calif., to Honolulu in the 1970s.
“He just never came back,” Brodersen said of his friend during in an interview from his home in Santa Ana.
Kasprzycki went to the University of Southern California, where he studied ancient history, Latin and philosophy. He was Phi Beta Kappa and graduated magna cum laude in 1969.
Brodersen told Kasprzycki that he should return to California, but he later came to realize that there were people in Lahaina who cared for him and took care of him.
Kasprzycki also had a bicycle that that he rode anywhere he needed to go, despite having a bad hip.
“Lahaina was actually the perfect setting for Paul,” Brodersen said.
Kasprzycki’s older brother Jan last spoke to him the afternoon of the fire. He told Kasprzycki to get out of Lahaina but he refused and insisted he would ride it out with his five cats.
The family didn’t know what happened to him until Monday, when they heard he had been found. Jan Kasprzycki said it was good to know “the end of the story.”
The family plans to scatter Kasprzycki’s ashes at Jan’s home in Olinda, about 4,000 feet above sea level on the slopes of Haleakala volcano.
“One of the best views of the ocean is is from up here,” he said. “He’ll get to see it every day 24/7.”
Jan Kasprzycki said he’d like people to know he brother was “a good, gentle and kind human being.”
Click here to view a list of individuals who have been confirmed dead by authorities as a result of the Aug. 8, 2023, wildfire in Lahaina.