StarBulletin.com

2 more indicted in Aliamanu home-invasion case


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POSTED: Thursday, November 13, 2008

An Oahu grand jury returned an indictment yesterday charging two more defendants with crimes in connection with an Aug. 11 home-invasion robbery in Aliamanu that left a 19-year-old man paralyzed from the waist down from a gunshot wound.

The indictment charges John Matt Rasalan, 17, with two counts of first-degree robbery, three counts of kidnapping, first-degree burglary and for committing the crimes using a firearm.

It also charges an 18-year-old woman, Kiara Garlasa Valdez, with being an accomplice to first-degree burglary.

Bail is $200,000 for Rasalan and $10,000 for Valdez.

Police said they arrested Rasalan Aug. 23 and petitioned the state Family Court to allow them to charge the teenager as an adult. A Family Court judge granted the request last Thursday.

Three other defendants, Kevin Khamsouk, 19; his younger brother, Kerry Khamsouk, 18; and Nicholas Nichols, 18, were previously indicted for the same crimes as Rasalan. Nichols is also charged with attempted second-degree murder.

Kerry Khamsouk was 17 at the time of the home-invasion robbery. The Family Court had previously waived its jurisdiction, allowing him to be charged as an adult. All of the defendants have prior arrests or convictions as adults or juveniles including for assault, terroristic threatening, harassment, theft and trespass, said Vickie Kapp, deputy prosecutor.

The four males and a fifth, unnamed male suspect entered a home on Hulakui Drive wearing masks and brandishing handguns, Kapp said. Nichols shot Timothy Lapitan when Lapitan, 19 at the time, rushed the culprits and pushed them out of the house, she said.

Lapitan, 20, has undergone at least seven surgeries and continues to undergo physical therapy, Kapp said.