The officer, 30, was booked at 12:40 p.m. yesterday at the Kalihi Police Station for suspicion of first-degree terroristic threatening. He was released without charges pending a criminal and administrative investigation.

The officer, who joined the department in January 1991, is assigned to the Kalihi district. He had been on vacation since May 18 and was expected to return at the end of the month, said Jean Motoyama, Police Department spokeswoman.

He will be reassigned to a desk job while the case is being investigated, she said.

Police said a 25-year-old Waialae man and a woman were standing at Aoloa Street and Kailua Road around 2:40 a.m. Saturday when they saw a man, later identified as the officer, walking by carrying a rifle case.

Words were exchanged between the two men, and the officer allegedly pulled out a gun and threatened the man, Motoyama said.

The victim managed to wrestle the gun away and called police.

The officer was taken to Castle Hospital and later transferred to Straub. He was held overnight and discharged just after noon Sunday, said Mark Doyle, Straub Hospital spokesman.

Police and hospital officials would not disclose his injuries.

This is the third department investigation opened this week that focuses on the conduct of police officers.

A 26-year-old Pearl City officer remains on administrative leave while homicide investigators and Internal Affairs investigate his role in the shooting death of 16-year-old Jared Fe Benito last Friday.

Fe Benito was the driver of a stolen car that fled from police amid gunfire early Friday after nearly hitting an officer in Waimalu, police said.

A sergeant and two other officers who were at the shooting are back at their jobs.

In another incident shortly after midnight Saturday, a Kailua officer fired shots at a man who pointed a handgun at him after he stopped to investigate a stolen Acura parked on isolated Kapaa Quarry Road. The man fled on foot after firing a shot at the officer.

Moments earlier, the officer had sustained a broken nose after another man assaulted him from behind as he got out of his car. His attacker fled in the stolen Acura.

Police yesterday arrested a 26-year-old Waimanalo man in connection with the Kapaa Quarry Road shooting after the stolen car was found parked at his home. No charges have been filed.