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Weapons drawn but not fired in Waimea Bay arrest


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POSTED: Sunday, December 13, 2009

Police had drawn their weapons and told 24-year-old Daniel Nichols to stop his silver Audi just before he allegedly accelerated toward a police officer at Waimea Bay Wednesday morning, a police affidavit said.

But the officers did not fire their guns.

One officer jumped out of the way as Nichols “;ducked his head behind the car's console and gunned the engine,”; accelerating toward her, the affidavit said.

The documents describe how what started out as a routine speeding stop—Nichols was clocked by a laser gun as going 62 mph in a 35-mph zone on Joseph P. Leong Highway near Haleiwa—ended with Nichols driving past the officers at the entrance to Waimea Beach Park and crashing into a Handi-Van on the highway before police arrested him.

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Nichols climbed from the Audi through a passenger window, continued to struggle and kick at police officers as they handcuffed him, the documents say

Nichols and the driver of the Handi-Van were injured in the crash and taken to a hospital.

Nichols had been arrested for first-degree attempted murder, but was charged with first-degree terroristic threatening. He was in custody on $100,000 bail.

He made his first court appearance Friday.

The officers who tried to give Nichols a speeding ticket followed him to Waimea Beach Park, where he allegedly drove erratically, reversing through the parking lot, making circles on the grass and crashing his car into a rock wall and two parked vehicles.