honoluluadvertiser.com

Sponsored by:

Comment, blog & share photos

Log in | Become a member
The Honolulu Advertiser
Updated at 3:29 p.m., Tuesday, October 7, 2008

Millionaire businessman killed in Kaimuki moped crash

Advertiser Staff

Hawaii news photo - The Honolulu Advertiser

DeWayne McKinney, who spent nearly two decades in prison for an Orange County, Calif., murder he insisted he did not commit and went on to start a multimillion-dollar business in Hawai'i, has died after a scooter accident in Honolulu.

Los Angeles Times photo by Allen J. Schaben

spacer spacer

A 47-year-old man has died following a moped crash early this morning in Kaimuki, the city department of the Medical Examiner said.

He was identified as DeWayne McKinney. He was taken to The Queen's Medical Center, where he was pronounced dead.

McKinney was heading toward Kahala on Wai'alae Avenue about 12:38 a.m. today when the 2007 moped he was driving drifted to the right and left the road just before 14th Avenue, according to police.

He ran into a metal bus stop sign pole and then struck a wooden utility pole, vehicular homicide investigators said. He was not wearing a helmet, police said.

Police said he was thrown from the moped and landed on the street.

Alcohol use did not appear to be a factor but speeding may have been, police said.

The Los Angeles Time Web site is reporting that McKinney "spent nearly two decades in prison for an Orange County murder he insisted he did not commit and went on to start a multimillion dollar business in the Hawaiian Islands."

The Web site said, "McKinney made national news in 2000 after Orange County District Attorney Tony Rackauckas obtained his release from prison, saying he'd been wrongly convicted of a 1980 robbery-murder at a Burger King in Orange."

The report goes on to say "McKinney had parlayed a $1-million legal settlement with the Orange Police Department into a multimillion dollar ATM business on the Hawaiian Islands and had been in discussions with movie studio executives about turning his life story into a feature film."

It quotes Carl Stein, who owned a company that processed transactions for McKinney, who said at the time of his death, McKinney owned 42 ATMs on three Hawaiian Islands and had a net worth of more than $6 million.

To read the LA Times report, go to http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-mckinney8-2008oct08,0,2570872.story