Newswatch
Police, Fire, Courts

By Star-Bulletin Staff

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[Taking Notice]

>> Maryknoll School sixth-grader Edwin Torres received top honors in the 2003 Nene Award Essay contest, open to grades 4 through 6 statewide. The award is sponsored by the Hawaii Library Association's Children and Youth Section, and the Hawaii Association of School Librarians.

>> Starbucks Coffee has awarded more than $1,400 to winners of the statewide Star Poets contest in April, and $5,500 to schools to support literacy programs.

Starbucks also gave $10,000 to Windward Community College, which co-sponsored the contest, to hold poetry workshops at 20 schools and community sites.

>> The Elsie H. Wilcox Foundation has given the American Cancer Society $5,200 to support the expansion of breast cancer early-detection programs on Kauai.

>> St. Andrew's Priory School has received an $8,000 grant from the Cooke Foundation to support the school's drama program.

>> The University of Hawaii Women's Campus Club has awarded six grants totaling $14,975 to the Hamilton and Sinclair libraries, the Theatre & Dance Department, the Campus Children's Center, the Waikiki Aquarium and Kapiolani Community College.

>> The University of Hawaii Center for Southeast Asian Studies has been awarded $230,000 per year for the next three years from the Foreign Language and Area Studies Fellowships Program of the U.S. Department of Education. The award will fund graduate fellowships for students who study Southeast Asian languages at Manoa.

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"Taking Notice" runs on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays. Please send items to City Desk, Star-Bulletin, 500 Ala Moana, Suite 7-210, Honolulu, HI 96813.

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Police, Fire, Courts



By Star-Bulletin staff

HONOLULU

Fire damages historic Dillingham building

A fire caused $620,000 damage to a third-floor law office yesterday in the historic Dillingham Transportation Building at 735 Bishop St., fire officials said.

The fire was confined to Suite 320, shared by attorneys Dennis Chang and Glenn Choy.

Damage was estimated at $450,000 to the building and $170,000 to its contents, said Honolulu Fire Department Capt. Scott Lawton.

The fire was reported at 6:11 a.m. Firefighters brought it under control at 6:31 a.m., officials said.

Dentist Kenyon Cardoza, who arrived for work shortly after 6 a.m., was stopped by firefighters before he could enter the building.

"I usually am there about 6," he said. "If I had been there earlier, I could have started the alarm a little earlier."

Cardoza, whose office is on the same floor, said he had to cancel his schedule. There was water damage near the elevators and a strong odor of smoke.

He said the building has no sprinkler system, but he would object to having one put in because installing plumbing would require the ceiling to be torn out and would destroy the architecture.

The four-story building was built in 1929 and is now part of the Pacific Guardian Center. No one was injured, and the cause of the fire is under investigation.

Suspect in stabbing is victim's ex-girlfriend

Police are investigating if a woman stabbed her former boyfriend and left him with a critical wound at a gasoline station yesterday.

Police said they responded to a report of a domestic argument at the Chevron Station at 1378 S. Beretania St. at 1:45 a.m. and found a 21-year-old man with a stab wound in his kidney area. He was taken to the Queen's Medical Center in critical condition.

The woman, 19, of Kailua, turned herself in to police about 3:35 a.m.

Kalihi man accused of sex assault on relative

Honolulu police arrested a 46-year-old Kalihi man for third-degree sex assault after he turned himself in Tuesday.

Police said the alleged victim in the case, now 15, said she had been sexually assaulted by the suspect, a family member, since 1998.

NEIGHBOR ISLANDS

2 Ohio men rescued after ocean accident

LAHAINA >> Firefighters rescued two Ohio men who were reported missing after they fell off a personal watercraft Tuesday in the ocean off the Hyatt Regency Maui in Kaanapali.

Assistant Fire Chief Greg Chong Kee said a rescue boat found the men about 1 1/2 miles north of the Hyatt resort at 6:36 p.m., a little less than an hour after they were reported missing.

The men had life vests on and were about 300 yards off Kahekili Park, also known as Airport Beach, Chong Kee said. They were not injured.

Piggery fire suspected of igniting brush land

WAILUKU >> Fire used to cook slop at a piggery may have caused a fire that blackened an acre of brush land Tuesday at Kuiaha Gulch in Haiku, said Assistant Fire Chief Greg Chong Kee.

The fire broke out about 3:15 p.m. and took more than three hours to extinguish, he said. It caused about $2,500 damage to a fence, but no one was injured.

Honolulu Police Department Crimestoppers