Democratic Party
official enters plea
in theft case
Marsha Joyner, a Democratic Party official and civil rights activist, has pleaded no contest to a theft charge involving a few thousand dollars from a Waikiki apartment association.
Joyner, 65, of Hawaii Kai, entered her plea Sept. 8 in Circuit Court to second-degree theft and is asking the judge to defer her plea. The court will rule on her request Dec. 10. If the judge grants the request, Joyner will have a chance to erase the charge from her record if she complies with court-imposed conditions.
Joyner, president of the Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Coalition-Hawaii and a member of the Democratic Central Committee, declined comment.
Her attorney, Deputy Public Defender William Jameson, said his client is "embarrassed as hell over this thing."
Prosecutors could not be reached for comment.
Joyner, a former president of the Apartment Owners Association of Kon Tiki 'Ano Hou, allegedly wrote "a few thousand dollars" of association checks to S&B Plumbing, a company owned by then-resident manager Grant Ricky Peters, Jameson said.
The checks apparently were signed by Joyner between March 1998 and October 2000 without the board's approval, he said. "Some of the money went to his company for work (the board) claimed was not done."
Peters, who was indicted for second-degree theft on March 12, has not been located. He is believed to be on the mainland.
Joyner unsuccessfully ran for the state Senate district covering Aina Haina and Kalama Valley in 2002.
