Alleged assault lands
protest figure in jail

A bankruptcy dispute involving
a cemetery may be behind
a case of HPD impersonation

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By Leila Fujimori
lfujimori@starbulletin.com

The organizer of a group of niche and plot owners protesting the bankruptcy reorganization of Honolulu Memorial Park was charged yesterday with third-degree assault and impersonating a police officer in the second degree.

Police said Wayne Kotomori, 55, entered the cemetery office, 22 Craigside Place, on Feb. 7, wearing a Honolulu Police Department baseball cap and T-shirt.

The cemetery's general manager, Steven Ruble, 52, said he had been on the phone with the park's lawyer and mentioned Kotomori's name but had never met him before and did not know what he looked like. Ruble said Kotomori told him, "I'm HPD."

Police said Kotomori walked behind Ruble, grabbed the phone receiver and struck him on the cheek. He then talked to the lawyer briefly and stormed out of the office, police said.

Ruble said police called him at home Saturday morning to come to the cemetery, where plot and niche owners have been picketing since Wednesday, to identify the suspect. He said the arrest had nothing to do with the group's protest.

Kotomori has said he is a family court bailiff.

Kotomori was jailed overnight and released on his own recognizance yesterday.

Kotomori's group protested the planned demolition of Honolulu Memorial Park's deteriorating pagoda, which houses niches for urns. He said the cemetery's beautiful setting, which includes the pagoda, was part of the reason his father bought there.

Jerrold Guben, attorney for Honolulu Memorial Park, will ask federal bankruptcy Judge Robert Faris tomorrow to allow an additional 30 days for voting on the reorganization plan, which includes tearing down the pagoda. He will also accept late proofs of claim.

Guben said an attorney for concerned niche and plot owners had objected that not all creditors were mailed ballots to vote on the reorganization plan.

The proposed plan would allow pagoda niche owners, no matter how many niches they own, to receive one replacement niche elsewhere in the cemetery.