The 24-year-old Hawaii Kai man accused of serving liquor to five underage females that allegedly led to the death of a teenage Papakolea girl says he didn't know she was underage and would have tried to stop her binge drinking.

Michael D.D. Clark, of Kahena Street, is charged with five counts of promoting intoxicating liquor to a person under the age of 21 at a party July 29 at his home. At the party was Makamae Ah Mook Sang, 15, who died of alcohol poisoning.

Deputy Prosecutor Richard Stacey said yesterday that he doesn't expect further charges against Clark, who now only faces misdemeanor counts.

Defense attorney Brook Hart said his client has “;deep remorse about what happened.”;

Hart said Clark didn't know Ah Mook Sang was underage and had consumed a lot of alcohol.

“;He would never allow that to happen,”; said Hart after Clark's preliminary hearing in Honolulu District Court.

  Delay In Trial Of Michael Clark

 

Due to lack of certain information, the prosecution and defense have agreed to delay in the court proceedings of Michael Clark.

[ Watch ]

 

“;He's very, very sorry,”; Hart told reporters in the seventh-floor hallway of the Alakea Street district courthouse with Clark standing behind him nodding in agreement.

Hart also stopped Clark from answering questions raised by reporters.

Hart said Clark wasn't ready to enter a plea and requested a continuance until Nov. 10, which was granted by District Judge Fay Koyanagi. Hart said he had meetings scheduled on the mainland and won't be back until Oct. 27.

During the preliminary hearing, Stacey raised the issue of whether Clark's case before Circuit Judge Richard Pollack would play any role in this matter.

Clark is awaiting sentencing on felony terroristic threatening conviction stemming from an early morning fight he had with Honolulu police officers at the Ala Moana Hotel on July 22, 2007, when they tried to stop Clark and Jon Cruz from assaulting John Agnello, according to court documents.

Clark was supposed to be sentenced Sept. 28, but his defense attorney, William Harrison, has filed a motion to have him examined by a panel of three mental experts, the Prosecutor's Office said. He faces a maximum of five years in prison and $10,000 fine. Bail in the assault case was set at $11,000.

Hart said he wasn't ready to comment about whether he would file a similar motion.

In July, Clark was identified by police as hosting a party at his parents' Hawaii Kai home between 10:45 p.m. July 29 and 4 a.m. July 30 where he allegedly served alcoholic beverages to two girls who were 15 and 16 and three 18-year-old women.

The medical examiner said Ah Mook Sang's blood-alcohol level was 0.433, more than five times the legal limit for a person driving.

Clark is free after posting $10,000 bail.

Ah Mook Sang had gotten her parents' permission to sleep over at her friend's house in Kahala after performing the hula at Kamehameha Schools, her mother, Tracy Ah Mook Sang, said. Instead, she went to a party at the home of a girl's boyfriend's cousin.

She would have been a junior at Roosevelt High School when the school year began on Aug. 3.