Son kills father over money for drugs

[lurkah]

This story is so tragic and sad, yet it's a graphic reflection of how insidious and horrific the meth epidemic really is.

A Waipahu man admitted killing his father and attacking his mother with a hatchet over the weekend after earlier asking his father for money to buy drugs, according to a police affidavit.

[alohabear]

Re: Son kills father over money for drugs

Ice again....sad

[craigwatanabe]

Re: Son kills father over money for drugs

see what happens when you don't give your kids a raise in their allowance? How's a kid supposed to afford drugs these days on $5 a week?

I hate to say this because it sounds really mean but the kid's addiction to drug use tells me the parents weren't doing as good of a job of raising this boy when it mattered. You reap what you sew. Too bad this kid turned out to be a weed.

[tutusue]

Re: Son kills father over money for drugs

[...]I hate to say this because it sounds really mean but the kid's addiction to drug use tells me the parents weren't doing as good of a job of raising this boy when it mattered. You reap what you sew. Too bad this kid turned out to be a weed.

Just a curiosity question and with all due respect...Do you lean toward the philosphy that in all cases it's the parent's fault when a kid goes off the deep end...even a 43 year old kid? FWIW, that did happen in my family but I haven't found that true across the board. In some cases it's true but I've seen other cases where the adult child got in with the wrong crowd. We as parents can teach right from wrong 'til we're blue in the face and there will just be some kids who flip it all off.

[craigwatanabe]

Re: Son kills father over money for drugs

Just a curiosity question and with all due respect...Do you lean toward the philosphy that in all cases it's the parent's fault when a kid goes off the deep end...even a 43 year old kid? FWIW, that did happen in my family but I haven't found that true across the board. In some cases it's true but I've seen other cases where the adult child got in with the wrong crowd. We as parents can teach right from wrong 'til we're blue in the face and there will just be some kids who flip it all off.

What we teach our kids in their formative lives, they take along on their long journey we call adulthood. Sometimes the reactions to an event is the result of a latent emotional memory that is triggered by that one event that broke the camel's back. You can teach them one way or another, but the right way is when they understand and comprehend the virtue of what's being taught. Anything else means you didn't get the message across. Kids will flip off a parent when they don't respect them. Good parenting skills would have prevented a flippant child and created a respectful one that listens to good advice.

How we behave and how well we reserve judgement upon others comes from your foundations of learning and understanding. What we become as adults is a direct result of how we layer our societal discretions upon each other.

There is always a root cause to the final act of civil disobediance.

In this case, why would a 43-year old man turn to drugs? If he grew up knowing and respecting the ill-effects of using illicit drugs he probably wouldn't have gotten himself into this mess.

If he tried drugs out of curiosity and became addicted, then his ability to steer clear of trouble was not supported by his role models (if any).

So let's look at genetics as a cause, well right there you can put the blame squarely on the previous generation that gave him those genes...his parents.

Rule out genetics and you got environmental causes. Another case for the parents. My parents were unskilled laborers but they didn't want us growing up in places that would negatively affect me and my siblings, so we moved to East Honolulu in a relatively safe district called Waialae Nui valley. Could we afford it? No way but both parents worked hard to afford this safe zone for their kids.

My parents took the inititive to protect us from a harsher environment. I grew up with expectations that being good meant staying out of trouble and grow up successfully. To some being good was, "eh I no can understand why da cops wen and shoot him afta he went surrenda himself wen he kidnapped his girlfriend...I mean he's really a good kid you know?"

Two different examples of what two different environments view as what is good. In this case, I'm a frickin saint if that guy was a good kid.

Somewhere during this 43-year old's life, his parents influenced him to react the wrong way when confronted with the curiosity of doing drugs: stay away from crap like that, or "well Dad never said drugs was bad".

Parents who care about their kids will do whatever it takes to protect them even if it means banning them from seeing their influential peer-pressure friends. Mine did and I'm glad they did it. Who knows how I could have been influenced if I hung out with the wrong crowd.

Sometimes parents have good intentions, like my former co-worker who once told me, "I'd rather have my underaged boy drink at my house with his friends where I can see him rather than drinking at a park". I look at him with disbelief! "What?!" He missed the point completely. Good parenting will influence the kid that underaged drinking is absolutely wrong and that a good kid will abide by societal laws created to protect life.

This kind of influence will mold the child's attitude on right and wrong into adulthood where with the proper tools the parents give him will steer him clear of trouble when it rears it's ugly head.

I tell my adolescent boys the same thing when they start questioning authority: My job at this point as your parent is to prepare you for life as an adult, by giving you the tools you'll need to cultivate your success, and teaching you how to use those tools when you'll need them. You will learn many things that will affect your wayward thinking. These tools will help you mold those thoughts into working solutions. Every once in a while you will learn a life lesson, an event that will change the course of your life. These tools will guide you through those uncertain times with proper judgement and put you on the right track to success or recovery. Hindsight is 20/20 and my experiences as a maturing adult will give you clear vision to see your goals as you build your own life independent of ours."

I have told this to two of my adult boys and I trust they will use these tools wisely as I have from my parents. I have four more children under our wings and we are teaching them good moral values so when it comes time to exercise proper judgement against uncertain events they will be prepared to act accordingly.

This 43-year old son didn't have quite the tools needed to save himself or his Dad from trouble. He either never had them or he lost them irresponsibly. Regardless, this man wasn't prepared to handle the situation that got him into his current problem.

In this case a good father would never let his son get that deep in substance abuse. If the arguement is that the father never knew his son was into drugs, then that goes to show how well the father communicated or kept in touch with his son.

If the father did know about his son's addiction, how could the father have let his son get this deep if he knew? Maybe he didn't care? Maybe he was too busy to see the warning signs. Either case, that's a sign of being a neglectful parent.

"But the boy is an adult now and not the responsibility of the parents". You can use that excuse legally, however it's still an excuse. As a parent you have 18-years to mold your children into law-abiding citizens. Failure to do so is failing as a parent and thus the kid fails in life later on as an adult without the proper tools to build a successful life of their own.

Invest in your childrens' life now when they're young, or pay later when they grow up. In the case of this father and son. The father paid later...with his life. Not a good return on an investment.

It all falls on the shoulders of the parents to raise their kids successfully. No one else has those honors, no one else has that responsibility.

[1stwahine]

Re: Son kills father over money for drugs

Craig, I agree with you except on one. Environment. I don't care where one raises their child. Be it in a castle or in the slum like I did. The main thing is to instill morals, values and beliefs into them to become productive adults of society.

My children may come from Humble beginnings but they know if they make one false move, I would kick their butt at any age. Soldeirs or not.

Bottom line...no make me SHAME!

Auntie Lynn

[alohabear]

Re: Son kills father over money for drugs

Craig, I agree with you except on one. Environment. I don't care where one raises their child. Be it in a castle or in the slum like I did. The main thing is to instill morals, values and beliefs into them to become productive adults of society.

My children may come from Humble beginnings but they know if they make one false move, I would kick their butt at any age. Soldeirs or not.

Bottom line...no make me SHAME!

Auntie Lynn

I agree with Aunty on this one too Craig, rotten apples can fall from the most beautiful trees too. If I remember (correct me if I'm wrong) you said in the past you live in Puna. Well to many of us life long Hawaii island residents , all the scum and druggies come from Puna( they don't BTW), but if you raise your kids well, they can be good apples no matter how the tree looks.

[craigwatanabe]

Re: Son kills father over money for drugs

Both of you are correct, I moved to the Puna area to get away from a more dangerous place...Honolulu.

People call Puna the wild wild west. That term came from a time when the Puna Police precinct was stormed by a gang and the detainee was freed. That happened a long time ago, and it has never happened again. Dana Ireland was killed in the Puna area too.

But with those two headline shockers, both still pale in comparison with the daily crap that comes out of Honolulu. Like the guy who was beaten to death outside a Kakaako bar for pissing on another's car over a year ago. Or the armed robbery of the Kahala American Savings Bank with automatic weapons, or that crack house that was busted on Kokohead avenue, both incidents occured less than three blocks from where I lived with my family in wat was supposed to be a relatively safe part of Honolulu!

What finally broke this camel's back was when that elderly man was robbed at gunpoint and his car stolen...in Aina Haina! These two guys broke into his locked home in a quiet residential area in East Honolulu, and literally threatened to kill him if he resisted. Aina Haina!! That was it. Honolulu wasn't as safe as it was 20-years ago. I looked for value + decency and I found Kea'au on the Big Island. The Puna Police told me they encounter 41 property crimes per year there. Big deal, Honolulu experiences that much almost daily.

Funny though it's mostly those from Hilo who have never ventured into the likes of Puna that coined that phrase: the wild wild west. Meanwhile the Hilo Tribune which posts the overnight crimes listing names and where they live, most of the crimes and criminals seem to be coming from the Hilo area!

Puna is so laid back and the people so country that when I moved here my closest neighbor two acres away came over and welcomed us with a cake! I was impressed.

My kids love this area and feel more secure than traffic congested Oahu. We aren't subjected to the daily road rage we encounter on Oahu's roadways and I can talk to total strangers here and develop a sense of rapport because we're not in any rush to get anywhere so we talk under the big tree next to the Kea'au Ace Hardware about why we moved away from Honolulu.

My kids chase the chickens we raise on our one acre lot (yes that's 41,000 sq. ft. of living area) In Honolulu you could subdivide that same lot into almost five separate Kapolei Zero Property lots!

When my closest neighbor decides to build his home adjacent to my lot, his home will have a setback of 15-feet from the property line or 30-feet from my kitchen window. Not like Kaimuki where I can pretty much look out of my kitchen window and see what my neighbor is cooking for dinner not even 12-feet away. Even closer if in Kapolei.

We got room to breathe out here in Puna, and my kids are affording the luxury of the rural life. This is the kind of life-reset my kids needed in order to appreciate a sense of a slower pace of living. As Braddah Iz (Isreal to his friends) coined in the lyrics...Take a walk in the country. It's a better life out here and as a parent I chose to give my kids the best environment to raise them in. The sacrifice was quitting a good paying job and a career in the gas utility industry and the broadcast industry, but I did it for my kids.

Yes even rotten apples grow on healthy trees, but that rotten apple got that way from malnutrition and it came from that tree's roots. My roots are here now in a much richer place where I can nourish my keiki the way I always wanted...the country life.

At least now my kids can have really warm and fuzzy stories to tell their grandkids about the times when they chased the chickens around our property or heading out into the thickets of the farm I owned at one time up here in Kurtistown. Going to the roadside stand to get fresh Kea'au corn (better than Kahuku), or walking down the cinder roads in our neighborhood looking for pig trails. That's the kind of stories I remember my dad telling me when he was younger living in Palolo! That's what Kahala was like when Farmers Road was literally a farmer's road.

A good environment maybe isn't vital but it sure helps for raising your children when it's a more innocent time and place. Kea'au reminds me of what Honolulu was like a long time ago before freeways cut thru residential neighborhoods and hotels blocked access to the beaches and tidepools. The town of Kea'au has only one intersection with a traffic light and no parking meters on the roads. Surrounding Kea'au town there are only three more in the outskirts.

Where I live kids take the bus or walk to school miles away. In Honolulu I had to escort my kid to Waialae Elementary school on 20th Avenue, and I lived on 18th! In Kaimuki I had to lock the front door when I worked in the backyard. When the kids played in the front yard I had to watch them from the likes of sexual predators lurking in parked cars across the street.

What kind of upbringing is that to place on a child. What kinds of stories are they going to tell their grandkids of their childhood?

Environment...in my book has a great influence on raising your children. True sometimes because of economics it's hard to pick and choose where to live, but I worked three jobs and rented to stay in what I thought was a relatively safe neighborhood with great schools. I grew up in Waialae on Kilauea Avenue in Waialae Nui Valley. Check out the home I grew up in: 5123 Kilauea Avenue, as middle-class suberbia as it gets. My dad did the same working long hours as a maintenance superintendant for the Alexander Young Building so we could afford this area we shouldn't have been able to live in.

But he did it so we could live in a safe neighborhood. Previous to that we lived in Palolo right about the time the housing project came up across Jarrett Intermediate and my older brother got beaten up everyday just because he was Japanese back in the 1950's. We moved to save his butt from further beatings to a safer place.

I did the same thing when Kaimuki became too dangerous for even my kids to play in the front yard, all 600-sq feet of it, a patch compared to what I got now. Now my kids can "Go Long for that Hail Mary football pass inside my lot and the only thing they gotta worry about is tripping over the chickens who get in their way!

I chose my enviroment for my kids to grow up in and made the sacrifices to do so. But I consider that an investment in their lives and that's what a parent is supposed to do, nurture their keiki. I'm much happier here, my kids are, my wife is (well she misses Ala Moana Shopping center). I attribute all of this happiness to changing environments. Now I can focus on the moral aspect of raising them without the distractions of the occasional drug bust down the street or that punk kid in that gang that demoralizes the rest of the students at my kid's school on Oahu.

Over here, it's simply...Mo Bettah! Even my urbanized teenage boys who loved Honolulu feel more relaxed and closer to the ohana now that we've moved here. Environment...it really does affect how we think and what we value.

If you can do a fantastic job raising your kids in a congested urbanized crime ridden hell hole of a neighborhood, well kudos to you...you did very well. BUT imagine raising them without those distractions? Environment, it really does matter.

[lurkah]

Re: Son kills father over money for drugs

A man accused of murdering his father and critically injuring his mother suffered from mental health problems and attacked his parents with a hatchet hours after he was denied money for drugs, the man's brother told police shortly after the incident.

Mark Kawakami, 43, is charged with the murder of his father, Sueo, 79, and attempted murder of his mother, Janet, 78, in their Waipahu home Saturday morning.

Putting a face to the name.

[oggboy]

Re: Son kills father over money for drugs

43 years and still living with your parents, asking for money for buy Ice.
Come on now. This guy must have given everything growing up, just to make him shut-up. That`s Why No CAN!!!

[alohabear]

Re: Son kills father over money for drugs

43 years and still living with your parents, asking for money for buy Ice.
Come on now. This guy must have given everything growing up, just to make him shut-up. That`s Why No CAN!!!

Auwe! He goes to court today and how much you like bet after he confessed to the cops and his brother(that he killed his parents), his attorney will tell him to plea "not guilty" and waste taxpayer money on a trial.

[adrian]

Re: Son kills father over money for drugs

*rethinks about living with parents at home*

But if I move to my other parent's house, will that still be living with them?

[lurkah]

Re: Son kills father over money for drugs

A 43-year-old Waipahu man told police he heard voices telling them he was "chicken" and to "do it" before he used a hatchet to kill his father and seriously injure his mother early Saturday at their Waipahu home, according to court testimony today.

He's a meth user and is claiming he heard voices telling him to do it. And so did this meth user (3 years in prison for firing a weapon in a secure area of Lihue Airport), and this meth user (sentenced to life with the possibility of parole for killing his wife). This is just the tip of the ugly meth iceberg. There are countless other druggies out there flying just under the media radar who are committing countless other crimes on a daily basis in order to feed their overwhelming and uncontrollable cravings. Is there any real hope and help out there for these people who apparently will not help themselves break free from this vicious cycle?