Remains of servicemen returned from Vietnam
The remains of seven United States servicemen unaccounted for from the Vietnam War were to be repatriated in a Hickam Air Force Base ceremony today.The remains were recovered in June and July by Vietnamese and U.S. military personnel assigned to Joint Task Force-Full Accounting at Camp Smith and the U.S. Army's Central Identification Lab at Hickam Air Force Base.
The recovery followed extensive investigative work to locate aircraft crashes or burial sites.
Following the repatriation ceremony, the remains will go to the Central Identification Laboratory to undergo analysis for individual biological identification.
Since it was created six years ago, the Joint Task Force-Full Accounting has repatriated almost 450 sets of remains.
Grants offered to help projects for Hawaiians
The state Department of Hawaiian Home Lands has $200,000 in grants available to native Hawaiians who have projects that benefit Hawaiians.The grants, from the department's Native Hawaiian Rehabilitation Fund, can be used as seed money to support self-help housing, health screening, legal services, farming, summer youth programs and community policing.
The department gave $203,000 in the last grant cycle of May 1998. The money was used for a summer camp and a playground on Kauai; to build houses on homesteads; an exercise and health program on Maui; and community organizing and planning at the Maku'u Farmers Association.
A grant was also awarded to the Maui AIDS Foundation.
Applications are available at any department district office or the DHHL Planning Office, 1099 Alakea St., 20th Floor. Call Christine Valles at 587-6424. The deadline to apply is Sept. 30.
Killer gets 20 years; could be out in seven
Manu Mamea says he couldn't understand why his always well-behaved son beat a 72-year-old neighbor to death last year.Now he agrees with Circuit Judge Wendell K. Huddy that the reason may have been drugs.
Huddy yesterday sentenced Mamea's son, who was convicted of manslaughter, to 20 years in prison with a mandatory minimum term of six years and eight months.
"I don't think we got to the truth in this trial," Huddy said.
Huddy and Mamea now know things the jury didn't.
Jurors in May found Sauileao Mamea Jr., 21, guilty of the lesser charge of manslaughter instead of murder. The defendant said he went to the Palolo Valley home of neighbor Francis C. King to collect $50 for telling King where he could buy marijuana. He said he slammed a toy pistol into King's head and beat him after King attacked Mamea Jr. and squeezed his testicles.
A presentencing report prepared after the verdict showed evidence of crystal methamphetamine in the defendant's blood following a motorcycle accident months before the beating death. But Mamea Jr. testified under oath that he had never used any drug but marijuana.
Work begins on H-1's Kunia interchange
Improvements at the Kunia interchange of the H-1 Freeway have begun, the state Department of Transportation advises.Work on the project includes constructing a new Ewa-bound off-ramp, a new Ewa-bound on-ramp, relocating a cane haul road, and widening the Honolulu-bound off-ramp and on-ramp.
The project also includes installing concrete barriers, retaining walls, noise barriers, sidewalks, highway lighting, drainage improvements, landscaping, striping and signs.
Work is scheduled to be completed in late 2000.
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Police, Fire, Courts
By Star-Bulletin staffRooms on 3 floors marred in fire at hotel
Nine fire units responded to a high-rise hotel fire in Waikiki that damaged rooms on three floors last night.No one was injured in the 7:39 p.m. blaze at the Seaside Hotel at 342 Seaside Ave., and no damage estimates were available. Firefighters brought the blaze under control at roughly 8 p.m.
The fire started on the fourth floor behind a shower and burned the interior of the wall to the fifth and sixth floors. The cause remained under investigation, but it might have been heat involved in an operation similar to welding, firefighters said. Some work on plumbing was under way. The fire didn't seem to have an electrical cause.
The 14-story building was not evacuated. Police diverted traffic to other streets.
"We needed to ventilate every apartment in that . . . stack of rooms," said fire Capt. Clyde Kobatake of the Waikiki station. All these rooms, affected by smoke, were unoccupied because of the plumbing work, he said.
2-1/2-year-old likely abducted by mother
Missing child Bianca Melia Dukesherer, 2-1/2, is unaccounted for since Aug. 18, when she was not returned from a scheduled visit.She is believed to be in the company of her noncustodial mother, "Monica Gabrielle Jung," also known as Monica Young. A photo of the child and suspected abductor is available on "Hawaii's Own Missing Child" Web site at hgea.org/HSC/.
Anyone with knowledge of the child's location should call Detective Bert Dement at 529-3099, the Missing Child Center-Hawaii at 586-1449, or the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children at 800-843-5678.
Back of Hilo store burns; owner suspects arson
HILO -- Fire of undetermined origin destroyed about half of the Puhi Bay Store in the Keaukaha area of Hilo this morning, the Fire Department said.The 2:11 a.m. fire caused $125,000 damage in the back of the L-shaped building where a kitchen, storage and guest room were located. The front of the store, valued at $180,000, was saved.
The owner, Pam Jackson, did not have insurance because the building was too old, fire officials said.
Jackson suspects arson, fire officials say, because a neighbor told her about hearing glass breaking and footsteps in the area. An investigation is continuing.
Stubborn brush fire at Yokohama Bay
Firefighters were battling an early-morning brush fire at the entrance to Keawaula (Yokohama) Bay.The fire posed no immediate threat to people or property, according to the Honolulu Fire Department. Companies were in the area yesterday fighting the brush fire, which flared up again about 2:30 a.m. today.
Police pull 3,240 pot plants in Hilo area
HILO -- Big Island police working with other law enforcement agencies yesterday seized 3,240 marijuana plants in a 70-mile stretch from Kukuihaele, north of Hilo, to Pahoa to the south, they said.The operation brought the total seized since Monday to 5,492 plants.
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