By Timothy Hurley
Advertiser Maui County Bureau
WAILUKU, Maui — Wesley Wong was in charge of state programs to protect Maui County’s forest lands and wildlife, but while on vacation in May 1999 he flew into a remote valley on the north shore of Moloka‘i with his son and used an illegal electroshock device to catch fish in the Wailau Stream.
That’s what state Attorney General Dwight Nadamodo told a Circuit Court jury yesterday in opening statements of a trial before Judge Shackley Raffetto.
Wong, 61, who retired as Maui District manager of the state Forestry and Wildlife Division at the end of 1999, is charged with landing a helicopter in the state forest reserve without a permit on May 7, 1999, and using an illegal electrical device to catch stream life. Both charges are misdemeanors that carry a fine of up to $1,000 and up to a year in prison.
Wong’s son, Matthew Wong, pleaded guilty to the illegal helicopter landing Tuesday, but the state dismissed the same electrical-device charge his father is accused of. Wong, 32, an employee of the U.S. Geological Survey, is scheduled to be sentenced by Raffetto April 19.
Several Moloka‘i residents testified yesterday they saw evidence indicating the father and son were fishing with an electrical device. One man said he saw cables from an octagon-shaped box leading into the stream. Others said they noticed whitened, discolored rocks and dead prawns and hihiwai (native snail) floating in the water.
Simoi Luafalemana and Solomon Alan Kong said the stream where the men were fishing was lifeless. They said rocks that were usually green were white, and dead prawns were orange rather than their natural color. Luafalemana said he saw a bag filled with hihiwai.
"It would have taken me all day to get that much,’’ he said.
But Wong’s attorney, Phillip Lowenthal, said the witnesses were mistaken. The so-called electrical device was merely an old octagon-shaped cylinder once used for military purposes. The men, he said, had brought the waterproof container to store their equipment.
"They didn’t need electrical equipment to get hihiwai. All they had to do was pick them off (of the rocks),’’ he said.
Lowenthal said the hikers were angry because of the ease with which the pair were brought to the remote location, about a mile from the ocean. At camp that night, he said, their anger grew as they discussed what they saw.
"After a while it turned into an electro-fishing device,’’ he said.
Donald Shearer, owner and president of Windward Aviation, testified that he flew the Wongs into Wailau Valley that morning as a favor during a trip to an O‘ahu job, picking them up on the way back. He said he didn’t notice anything unusual about what the pair were carrying.
Asked to explain why he wasn’t prosecuted for landing his helicopter, Shearer said he agreed to give "open and honest’’ testimony.
As for the charge against Wong for landing the helicopter, Lowenthal said his client was merely a passenger and shouldn’t be prosecuted. In addition, he said, there is some question about whether the area in which they landed — an abandoned taro growing spot — is actually part of the forest reserve.
[back to top] |
