Jonathan Kalani Ibana, 21, this week pled guilty to second-degree attempted murder and sexual assault in the third degree, and faces a sentence of up to life in prison with the possibility of parole when he is sentenced in July.
Jonathan Kalani Ibana, 21, this week pled guilty to second-degree attempted murder and sexual assault in the third degree, and faces a sentence of up to life in prison with the possibility of parole when he is sentenced in July.
The sexual assault charge carries a sentence of up to five years in prison.
Ibana was charged with stabbing his then-girlfriend in the back three times at a Wailua Homesteads residence during an argument last August, after the girl, 14 at the time of the incident, tried to scale down the relationship as she was preparing to enter high school.
She was hospitalized for several days following the attack, and a surgeon testified during one of Ibana’s hearings that one of the knife wounds penetrated one of the girl’s kidneys.
Ibana was held at Kauai Community Correctional Center in Wailua in lieu of $250,000 bail, after Crime Stoppers tips led police to the lobby of the Holiday Inn SunSpree Resort in Wailua two days after the attack and only a few hours after The Garden Island ran a front-page photo and story about police searching for him.
Jury selection was yesterday, and a trial begins today, involving Mark E. Vargas, 47, of Kekaha, in an alleged case of attempted murder.
According to prosecutors and police reports, Vargas, who has only one arm, is accused of allegedly stabbing a 59-year-old Kekaha man at Kekaha low-income housing units, where Vargas lives, after a day of drinking and in a dispute over $20.
The alleged incident occurred in early November of last year.
Vargas claimed the victim was bullying him. In earlier court proceedings, Erick T.S. Moon, attorney for Vargas, said his client was physically incapable of attacking anyone, and that the victim would have had to have walked into any knife.
The unidentified victim suffered injuries in the alleged attack severe enough to warrant him being flown to The Queen’s Medical Center on O’ahu, where he remained confined for several weeks.
Also in earlier court proceedings, District Court Judge Trudy Senda did not find probable cause to charge Vargas with attempted murder, and reduced the prosecutors’ original charge to assault.
But prosecutors took the case to a grand jury, which reinstated the attempted murder charge. Vargas had been in KCCC in lieu of $20,000 bail.
In another trial this week, a jury took just 90 minutes to find a Kapa’a man not guilty of charges of first-degree burglary and several counts of sexual assault allegedly involving a former girlfriend.
According to public defender James Itamura, Andrew Hershenson was accused of forcing a former girlfriend to have sex with him, and of entering her home without permission, in an incident that allegedly took place over a year ago.
Itamura and Hershenson argued during the trial that consensual sex had ensued, and one juror told Itamura the panel felt Hershenson was more credible than the Kilauea woman.
But Russell Goo, with the county prosecutor’s office, said there were some facts in dispute, including whether or not the victim consented or was passed out after drinking and doesn’t remember a thing.
Obviously, Goo said, the jury found Hershenson more credible than the complainant.
“It was disappointing, because I thought the community had gotten to the point where we would protect our victims,” said Goo, who attempted to portray Hershenson as a sexual predator who knew the victim was inebriated when he went to her home.
