A 41-year-old man would have faced life imprisonment without the possibility of parole at his sentencing Friday for critically injuring a Honolulu police officer by twice striking the back of his head with a foot-long metal car jack extension in the early morning hours of Feb. 16, 2023, in Laie.
But on Jan. 19 an Oahu Circuit Court jury found Hokuokalani Patoc guilty, not of the first-degree attempted murder offense he was charged with, but of the lesser crime of first-degree assault.
So instead of life without parole, Circuit Judge Paul Wong sentenced him to the maximum term allowable: 16 years in prison.
Patoc was tried on charges of first-degree attempted murder, resisting an order to stop and first- degree unauthorized control of a propelled vehicle for jumping into the officer’s subsidized vehicle and fleeing along the North Shore to Wahiawa and ending up at Iolani Palace, where he was arrested. He was convicted of the latter two charges.
On Friday, Deputy Prosecutor Lawrence Sousie argued for consecutive sentencing because Patoc poses a danger to society, citing troubling incidents with authority.
The judge concurred, sentencing Patoc to back-to-back terms of 10 years for first-degree assault and five years for unauthorized control of a vehicle for driving off in officer Nakia Newton’s Ford Explorer.
He also sentenced him to one year for resisting an order to stop a motor vehicle.
In sentencing Patoc, Wong said, “All we’re focused on is what happened on that dark street,” the serious harm he caused and the lack of any strong provocation by Newton.
“The court is skeptical” whether it is likely to recur and whether probation and rehabilitation are appropriate.
He said due to the extremely violent nature of the offense, and its long-lasting effects, probation is not appropriate.
“No matter how courteous you are,” the judge said, “there is a serious dimension of risk to the public.”
Patoc’s court-appointed attorney, Keith Shigetomi, had argued that after the evidence phase of the trial, the jury found an extended term was not necessary for protection of the public, and it was inconsistent to ask the court for a longer sentence.
But that argument did not hold water with the judge, who said the court and not the jury makes the decision.
Court records show Newton responded to a 5 a.m. call Feb. 16, 2023, of a road rage incident, and found Patoc standing in the middle of Iosepa Street next to his Toyota 4Runner.
Sousie said Newton told Patoc to “wait a minute” and “stop,” but Patoc refused to put down the car jack extension.
He said that there was no provocation by Newton for the attack and that the first-degree attempted murder charge was appropriate.
Newton, who was in the courtroom gallery, sustained bleeding to the brain, skull fractures and a scalp laceration. Sousie said that had he not received quick treatment, he might not have survived.
He continues to suffer the effects of his injuries, with headaches, loss of a sense of smell, injury to his shoulder, which requires surgery, and he remains unable to return to work.
On Feb. 14, two days before the police attack, Patoc was arrested for criminal trespassing at an elementary school where he was looking in the school cafeteria for one of his children.
Patoc pleaded no contest Friday to the first-degree criminal trespassing charge on Feb. 14, 2023, for his refusal to leave the elementary school campus, and he was sentenced to time served.
Sousie said the mother of Patoc’s four children filed a protective order Feb. 22 in Family Court, and Sousie said only after Patoc was incarcerated did she feel safe to do that.
Patoc countered that the reason she did it was to ensure she received full custody of the children.
Ex-wife Elizabeth Diamond sought temporary prohibition of visitation with the children, and mental health and drug treatment and rehabilitation and anger management for Patoc.
Diamond’s petition says two of their children told her that on Feb. 9 Patoc said “something was following them” and that “the car was talking to him.”
Shigetomi, who replaced Patoc’s trial lawyer Deputy Public Defender Reiko Bryant, said, “There are so many question marks,” and added that everything happened in just two weeks.
“I’ve spoken to his family, who still love and support him and still want him to get help” for mental health and substance abuse.
He said Patoc was unable to contest the criminal trespassing charge and the petition for protective order, which was granted by default, because he was incarcerated and could not show up.
Wong had ordered of his own accord on July 24 a determination of mental fitness for Patoc. Three months later Judge Ronald Johnson, upon a review of mental health examiners’ reports, found him fit to proceed to trial.
Sousie also said the evening before the attack on Newton, Patoc trailed and rammed into the rear of a car, but Shigetomi argued he had not been convicted of that.
Patoc had twice previously refused to participate in the standard pre- sentence investigation, over the advice of his lawyer.
Patoc asked the judge whether the parole board would know about his criminal background, which was curious since he has no prior criminal convictions.
Wong, as did Shigetomi, said a pre-sentence report could be beneficial to Patoc when he goes before the Hawaii Paroling Authority to see that he had no prior criminal conviction, what his educational background is (he is a high school graduate) and that he had been on good behavior while incarcerated.
He told the judge that he had been afforded privileges and jobs while at the Oahu Community Correctional Center, and guards said they would write letters of support of his good character, but because of his high bail amount, initially $1 million, he lost those jobs.
Patoc said that during the fitness exams by mental health experts, “how I presented myself — I’m not a threat to society in their report.”
Wong gave him another opportunity Friday to have a pre-sentence investigation, but he wanted to go forward with the sentencing.
Members of Patoc’s family, including his sister and her children, but none of his own children, were present to say their goodbyes before he was taken again into custody.
