Police say wounded
Maui man had a gunThe suspect was shot in the
shoulder Friday by a police officer
WAILUKU >> The handgun seized from a 25-year-old Kula man after he was shot in the right shoulder by a Maui police officer Friday morning was a semiautomatic pistol and loaded, Police Lt. Glenn Cuomo said.
Cuomo said investigators have no record of the weapon being registered to the wounded man.
"We're looking into the history of the firearm now," Cuomo said.
The man was shot after police repeatedly warned and tried to take the handgun from him while he was in a car parked on Pueo Drive next to a vacant lot on Hawaiian Homes land, police said.
A couple of patrol officers arrived at Pueo Drive about 8:13 a.m. Friday, responding to a call about a man who had been hit by a baseball bat.
In the course of investigating the allegation, police tried to talk with the woman in the car and saw the man reach for the handgun, police said.
The man, sitting in the passenger front seat, had grabbed the handgun from beneath the seat as police approached the vehicle and spoke to a woman in the driver's seat of the car, police said.
The man had been listed in critical condition Friday night but was in guarded condition yesterday at Maui Memorial Medical Center.
Cuomo said charges are pending against the man, who is being guarded by police at the hospital.
He said the woman, who was an acquaintance of the man, was not arrested.
Cuomo said police have impounded the vehicle, a blue Honda, and plan to search it.
Cuomo said investigators were trying to determine the ownership of the car.
The last time a man was shot by a Maui police officer was on June 4, 1992, when a male juvenile was wounded while police were investigating a burglary at a sporting goods store, Deputy Police Chief Kekuhaupio Akana said.
