A 31-year-old Ocean View man died Wednesday afternoon after a Hawaiʻi Island police officer shot him during a search in dense brush and unstable lava rock, following a reported theft and a Taser that failed to stop him; a second officer was found with a bleeding arm. Police have identified the man killed as Nafetelai Teisina.
A Theft Report Leads to a Search
According to police, a woman flagged down a Kaʻū patrol officer at 4:10 p.m. Wednesday and reported a theft in a shopping-center parking lot along Mamalahoa Highway. Police placed the location in the 92-8700 block of the highway, though Hawaii News Now reported the alleged vehicle theft happened in the 92-9700 block — a discrepancy neither outlet has resolved.
Officers approached the man the woman identified, and he ran into a nearby area of dense brush and unstable lava rock, according to Big Island Now. Police searched the rugged terrain, and a second officer arrived to help. During the search, the two officers became separated.
Taser Fails, Officer Opens Fire
Police say Teisina threw rocks at the second officer, who responded with loud verbal commands and deployed his Taser multiple times, according to Big Island Video News. The commands and the Taser were both ineffective, the outlet reported, and the officer then fired his service weapon.
The first officer told dispatch he heard shots fired, then found the second officer with a bleeding arm and Teisina on the ground, unresponsive, per the station's report. The officer apprehended Teisina and began life-saving measures until Hawaiʻi Fire Department medics arrived, the same account notes. Teisina was pronounced dead at the scene shortly after 5:23 p.m.
The injured officer was taken to Kaʻū Community Hospital for treatment and later released, and no other officers or members of the public were hurt, per the same outlet. KHON2 was among the stations to report the department's account of how the encounter unfolded.
Rookie Officer Placed on Leave, Review Underway
The officer who fired his weapon has served with the department for less than a year and is assigned to the Kaʻū patrol division, according to the Hawaiʻi Police Department. He has been placed on administrative leave while the department's Office of Professional Standards conducts a critical incident review, which the department describes as standard practice following officer-involved shootings.
The investigation remains active and ongoing, Big Island Now reported. Police identified the man killed as 31-year-old Nafetelai Teisina of Ocean View.
A Wider Pattern on Police Use of Force
The shooting lands amid broader scrutiny of police use of force in Hawaiʻi. A University of Hawaiʻi study found that Honolulu Police Department use-of-force incidents jumped from 706 in 2010 to 2,646 in 2021 — a 275% increase, the Star-Advertiser reported in an earlier story.
The FBI, which tracks use-of-force data nationally, cautions that its figures offer only broad trends and do not determine whether officers followed department policy or acted lawfully in any individual case. That limitation applies here too: the evidence gathered so far does not establish whether Wednesday's shooting was legally justified or whether the officer followed department policy, and the results of the critical incident review have not been released.
