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The Honolulu Advertiser
Posted on: Saturday, December 6, 2003

Police describe botched arrest

By David Waite
Advertiser Courts Writer

Two police officers who entered a Kapolei ice cream store to arrest a man wanted on attempted-murder charges were not wearing bulletproof vests and were operating on the faulty assumption that the man was not armed, his fellow officers said in court yesterday.

Police Lt. Bill Kato describes for the jury the arrest of Shane Mark in which Officer Glen Gaspar was killed.

Jeff Widener • The Honolulu Advertiser

Within three to five minutes of entering the store, one of the officers lay near death on the floor, shot twice in the left chest and once in the hand by Shane Mark, the man they sought to arrest.

Mark, 29, who is being tried on charges of murdering Officer Glen Gaspar and other offenses, is claiming self-defense, contending the plainclothes officers did not identify themselves.

Police Lt. William Kato, head of the plainclothes detail whose six members went to arrest Mark, told the jury about the strategy behind what they thought would be a routine arrest.

He said Mark's former girlfriend, Melissa Sennett, had assured him and another member of the team that Mark would not be carrying a gun to a meeting set for noon that day in the Baskin-Robbins ice cream parlor at Kapolei Shopping Center.

Kato said police had received a call from Sennett at about 10:30 a.m. through the Honolulu Police Department's CrimeStoppers telephone tip line, saying that she, her current boyfriend and her 10-year-old daughter, fathered by Mark, were going to meet with Mark in Kapolei.

"I asked her if she felt Shane would come armed, and she said, 'No, he would never do that around our daughter,'" Kato said.

The next 45 minutes were spent getting the arrest warrants for Mark, who was wanted in connection with a shooting Feb. 1, and a recent photograph to make sure they arrested the right person.

Police say Mark fired a handgun at two men that day at the First Assembly of God church parking lot in Moanalua, hitting one of them in the thigh.

Mark's defense centers on the contention that he thought the men trying to arrest him at the Kapolei Shopping Center were retaliating and possibly trying to kill him for the Moanalua shooting.

With the warrants and updated photograph in hand, Kato said he and his team loaded into an unmarked police van and headed toward Kapolei.

Because time was running short, the police officers developed three arrest options should they meet up with Mark as planned, Kato said.

One was to arrest him as he pulled up and was getting out of his car. But police didn't know what kind of car he would be driving and wouldn't have an opportunity to get close enough to make sure he was the right person, Kato said.

Another option was to wait for Mark to get out of his car and walk through the parking lot, then arrest him as he was about to enter the store. But the officers were faced with the same problem of not getting a close look at him first, the potential of a foot chase through the noontime lot crowded with cars and people, and the possibility that Mark might try to take a civilian hostage, Kato said.

He said team members decided on a plan, which he approved, to wait for Mark to walk into the ice cream shop and start talking to Sennett and the girl, essentially confirming he was the man they were looking for. He said Sennett had been told to get out of the ice cream store as soon as two of the officers, Gaspar and Calvin Sung, approached Mark.

He said he had described the two officers to her, giving their heights and weights and the clothes they would be wearing — aloha shirts and slacks. He said Gaspar and Sung entered the store without protective vests.

"The vests are quite thick, and if you wear them with aloha shirts, it would be quite obvious to anyone out there that you are wearing something under your aloha shirt," Kato said.

In response to questions from Mark's lawyer, state Deputy Public Defender Debra Loy, Kato said that the vests are issued to all police officers and that the Police Department has a policy on their use.

"I believe the policy is wear them when you know firearms will be present," Kato said.

He said he and detective Bruce Swann were watching the Baskin-Robbins store from a nearby Dunkin' Donuts shop and headed to the ice cream store when Gaspar and Sung entered, in a signal that had been agreed upon earlier.

It also was the signal for police detectives Shannon Kawakami and Kenneth Higa to pull up in front of Baskin-Robbins in the unmarked police van from which they had been watching the store.

Higa testified that things were going as planned, with Kato and Swann approaching the Baskin-Robbins from one direction on foot, he and Kawakami approaching in the van from another direction and Gaspar and Sung in the store attempting to arrest Mark.

But as soon as the van pulled up to the front of the store, Higa said he could see Mark resisting arrest, struggling with Sung and Gaspar on either side. He said he ran into the store, approached Mark from the back and put his arms around him, attempting to "bear-hug" him.

"I told him, 'Stop resisting, stop resisting,'" Higa said. About five seconds later, Higa said he heard "two popping sounds," and at that point everyone fell to the floor. About five seconds after that, Higa said he heard a third shot.

"Then I heard Glen Gaspar say, 'I've been shot' and then a gurgling sound," Higa said.

Gaspar was pronounced dead at St. Francis-West Medical Center about 45 minutes later.

City Deputy Prosecutor Christopher Van Marter said he expected to wrap up the prosecution's case when the trial resumes in Circuit Judge Karen Ahn's courtroom on Tuesday.

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