Trial begins today in officer's killing

By David Waite
Advertiser Courts Writer

The trial of an O'ahu man accused of killing a police officer at a Kapolei Shopping Center ice cream parlor on March 4 and attempting to kill a second officer moments later begins today in Circuit Judge Karen Ahn's courtroom.

Shane Mark goes on trial today in the March 4 shooting death of police officer Glen Gaspar in a Kapolei business. Advertiser library photo • March 6, 2003

The trial for Mark is expected to last up to two weeks, with the prosecution taking about a week to 10 days and calling as many as 40 witnesses.

State Deputy Public Defender Debra Loy has indicated that Mark will not dispute that he shot Gaspar, 40, but will argue that he was acting in self-defense, believing that Gaspar and other plainclothes officers who approached him without identifying themselves were the same men, or acting on behalf of the men, involved in the Feb. 1 shooting.

Mark allegedly had traded crystal methamphetamine for a video surveillance camera that he later found to be defective and had gone to the parking lot of the First Assembly of God church on Moanalua Road to confront the men about the camera.

Mark is accused of shooting at two men, which resulted in attempted murder charges against him.

Police were searching for Mark when, on March 4, they got a tip that he would be at the Kapolei Baskin-Robbins to meet with his former girlfriend and mother of his daughter.

What should have been a routine arrest went wrong when Mark reached into his waistband, took out a handgun and shot Gaspar, resulting in the charge of first-degree murder, according to prosecutors.

City Deputy Prosecutor Christopher Van Marter will argue that Mark then pointed the gun at police officer Calvin Sung and pulled the trigger, but the gun misfired, resulting in a charge of attempted first-degree murder.

If convicted of murdering Gaspar or attempting to murder Sung, Mark will face a mandatory term of life in prison without the possibility of parole.

He also is on trial on two counts of attempted second-degree murder related to the Feb. 1 shooting.

Van Marter is expected to claim during the trial that the gun used in the Feb. 1 incident was the same one used to kill Gaspar, and that Mark traded crystal methamphetamine to get the gun.

Mark pleaded guilty Nov. 7 to drug and weapons charges stemming from both the Gaspar shooting and church parking lot incident.

While the prosecution had hoped to argue that Mark was under the influence of crystal meth at the time Gaspar was shot, Ahn ruled previously that the results of a blood sample taken from Mark shortly after the Gaspar shooting may not be used as evidence during the murder trial.

Gaspar was rushed to St. Francis-West Medical Center immediately after the shooting. Mark was taken first to the Kapolei police station and then to St. Francis-West after he became "unresponsive."

As Gaspar was being declared dead in one emergency treatment room, Mark was being treated in an adjoining room by doctors trying to figure out why he was not responsive.

Based on a prior Hawai'i Supreme Court ruling, Ahn concluded that Mark did not provide the blood sample willingly and had an expectation that the results of the test would remain part of his private medical record. The results of the blood test have never been made public.

Van Marter has said the ruling to exclude the blood sample as evidence should not affect the prosecution's case, which will be based primarily on the testimony of numerous eyewitnesses to the shooting, and possibly a video of the incident made by the boyfriend of Mark's former girlfriend.

Reach David Waite at dwaite@honoluluadvertiser.com or 525-8030.