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Trial begins in shooting
death of Ewa Beach man

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By Debra Barayuga
Star-Bulletin

"I never think," he said, and started to cry.

That's how Edwin Kim responded when asked why he fired his gun at a Toyota Tercel whose occupants he believed had thrown rocklike balls of dirt at him and his friends earlier.

Little did he know that the bullet went completely through the chest of one man and just missed the driver before hitting the dashboard.

Killed in the Nov. 20 shooting was 21-year-old Gercel Ong of Ewa Beach.

Kim, 23, who went on trial yesterday in Circuit Judge Sandra Simms' courtroom, is charged with second-degree murder and two firearms offenses in what the state characterizes as a dispute between rival gangs, KGB and BTK. If convicted of murder, Kim faces 20 years in prison with the possibility of parole.

Although there was talk that the occupants of the Tercel were rival BTK, or Born to Kill, gang members, defense attorney Keith Shigetomi disputes that the shooting was gang-related.

Kim didn't even know who Gercel Ong was, nor aim at anyone's head, Shigetomi said. "When Eddie fired that gun that one time, he did so without thinking."

He said Kim reacted out of fear, anger and frustration that night and did not intend or know he was going to shoot someone. "They'd gone too far and Eddie regretted what he did. It was stupid."

The state contends Kim knew exactly what he was doing that night when he and his friends jumped into three separate cars and began chasing the Tercel around Ewa Beach.

"Gercel Ong was chased down, boxed in and shot in the back while retreating," Sacks said.

When the driver of the Tercel refused to pull over out of fear, Kim leaned out the passenger-side window of his car, steadied his gun in both hands and aimed two to three seconds before firing a single shot, said deputy prosecutor Eric Sacks.

When asked later by his driver what he was aiming at, Kim responded, "At the head."

Kim is the leader and founder of KGB, or Kids Gone Bad, Sacks said.

The state expects to show that shortly after the shooting and in the days following, Kim met with friends involved in the chase to coach them on what to tell police if questioned. He also made threats to the effect that "If anyone talks to police, they gonna die," Sacks said.

The trial is expected to last about 1-1/2 weeks.