Pacific Notes
Pacific Notes
Pacific Notes
Prosecutors Seek Maximum Term for Guam Student
Prosecutors have indicated they will seek the District of Columbia’s harshest criminal penalty against Guam resident Joseph M. Mesa, Jr., the 21-year-old Gallaudet University student accused of killing two classmates at the prestigious Washington, DC, university for deaf and hearing-impaired students. Mesa is accused of committing the September murder of Eric F. Plunkett and February murder of Benjamin Varner. Varner was stabbed 19 times, according to news reports, and Plunkett was beaten to death. Both students lived in the same dormitory as Mesa and were slain in their rooms.
Mesa was indicted by a grand jury June 13 and has been charged with two counts of first-degree murder while armed, and 13 other felonies. Mesa faces a minimum sentence of 60 years in prison if convicted of first-degree murder in both killings and faces the possibility of life without parole. His trial is scheduled to begin Nov. 5.
Mesa has pled not guilty to the charges, though District police say Mesa admitted to them in February that he had killed his classmates. Mesa had not been a suspect in the slayings until he allegedly made the statements to police officials.
—Gregory Glass
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New Star Over Hawaii
Inter-island cruising in Hawaii will receive a major shake-up in December with the arrival of Norwegian Star, a $400 million, 91,000 ton “super-ship” with a 2,200-passenger capacity, 10 restaurants and a 1,150-seat theater (“with European opera house ambience”). Norwegian Star is expected to cruise year round in the Hawaiian Islands, with an itinerary taking in Oahu, Hawaii, Maui, Kauai and Fanning Island (Tabuaeran). The inclusion of Fanning Island, one of the Line Group in Kiribati, is necessary to comply with U.S. maritime regulations that require vessels of foreign registry to include at least one foreign port in an otherwise wholly U.S. itinerary.
The new arrival is part of the redeployment of a number of cruise vessels following the take-over in March 2000 of the Miami-based Norwegian Cruise Line (NCL) by Star Cruises of Malaysia. As a result of the acquisition, Star found itself with an additional eight vessels, bringing its total fleet to 20 and placing it equal third with P&O in the global hierarchy of cruise companies.
The effect of a ship the size of Norwegian Star on the Hawaiian holiday market is not really predictable. Not surprisingly, Star and its expensively adopted offspring, Norwegian Cruise Lines, are being bullish about the prospects.
“In looking at the potential demand for this market,” said Colin Veitch, president and CEO of NCL, “we made the decision to utilize a larger and absolutely brand new ship…certainly light years ahead of anything else in the year-round Hawaii cruise market.”
—Norman Douglas
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Greenpeace Presence Upsets Army Missile Testers
While the rest of the world was plied with news about the first missile defense test of President George W. Bush’s administration in the 10 days leading up to the $100 million test in mid-July, most of the Marshall Islands was focused on the gyrations of the U.S. Army in response to having a single Greenpeace representative camped out on one of Kwajalein’s 93, non-restricted islands.
In the week before the test, security was beefed up to unprecedented levels by the Army in response to an early April visit of Greenpeace’s flagship Rainbow Warrior. Dozens of heavily armed military police were flown in to guard the base; for the first time in 40 years of missile testing, the Marshall Islands was brought into help with security, stationing its Australian-provided patrol vessel “Lomor” off Ebwaj Island to keep an eye on Greenpeace’s Alice Leney. U.S. Army and Marshall Islands security put him under round-the-clock surveillance in the week leading up to the test, including helicopter surveillance.
Publicly, Lt. Col. Steve Morris, Kwajalein’s assistant chief of staff, operations, said in the Kwajalein Hourglass newsletter that Leney was “peacefully protesting within the bounds of the law,” and added that no action would be taken against anyone unless they broke the law.
But behind the scenes U.S. officials had been pressing Marshall Islands officials to deport Leney, an Australian, for most of the two months he’d been camping on Ebwaj with the consent of local landowners.
What forced the Marshalls government to act was a blunt statement by the State Department’s chief Compact negotiator that future funding support by the U.S. Congress would depend, in part, on “how well the Marshall Islands fulfills its commitment under the Compact to support operations at Kwajalein.
“Prompt responses by the Marshall Islands to U.S. security concerns are particularly important (to future funding approval),” negotiator Allen Stayman said at the opening of negotiations for a new economic aid package.
A day later, and just 48 hours before the high-profile U.S. missile defense test, Marshall Islands police arrested Leney and brought him back to Majuro to face deportation charges. In the past 12 months, Greenpeace had organized two two-person, non-violent, banner-holding protests at Kwajalein.
The basis for the preemptive deportation order was the contention that Leney had been involved in previous protests at the range, and was going to “disrupt” the test.
He disputed that he was intending to “disrupt” the test, saying that he was there to “bear witness for millions of people worldwide” who oppose Bush’s missile defense plans.
Local landowner and Senator Sato Maie was angered by the arrest, saying that he and other ranking Kwajalein leaders had given their assurances to U.S. officials that there would be no disruption of the test.
At Leney’s first court hearing after the arrest, Chief Justice Charles Henry described the situation as a “relatively unusual procedure,” noting that it was not a criminal proceeding and that Leney had not been accused of any crime. The matter was pending at press time.
After the hullabaloo with Leney, the July 15 missile defense test at Kwajalein was a success. The missile interceptor launched from Meck Island in Kwajalein destroyed the incoming target, a mock nuclear warhead launched from California. Everything didn’t work perfectly, however, as one of the primary ground-based sensors reported the two missiles had missed each other.
—By Giff Johnson
U.S. Aids Exodus from Wilderness Camp
In late July, U.S. and Canadian authorities removed 23 teenagers from a center for troubled youth in Samoa after allegations of abuse. The U.S. Embassy in Apia received a number of complaints during July about the Pacific Coast Academy. U.S. Charge d’Affaires James A. Derrick said that the allegations “were very serious and were coherent, credible and consistent.” Embassy officials prevented the allegedly abused students from speaking to the media.
The Samoa Attorney General’s office said that police are investigating the charges and that it was meeting its international obligations to insure that the U.S. citizens gained access to their consular representatives, and that serious complaints were properly investigated.
Pacific Coast Academy is reportedly owned by Samoan entertainer Dave Parker and by Stephen Cartisano (who also goes by the names Scott Richards and Steve Michaels). It is reportedly operated by an Arizona-based non-profit group.
This is the third center to “rehabilitate” American teens in Samoa that has been accused of abuse, with the most serious allegations against Paradise Cove, which was closed two years ago.
An American teenager said on a national television program that he was “hog-tied” and had his face “shoved into the dirt” at the Paradise Cove camp, which is now closed. The 17-year-old American was sent by his mother to Paradise Cove camp in Samoa in the hope that it might change his life. But the teenager told the American television program Investigative Reports aired on A&E Network about abuse he experienced at the camp.
The A&E program focused on the “wilderness therapy” camps that are popping up across the U.S. and in other parts of the world such as the West Indies and Samoa.
These camps have been criticized for the harsh methods used in behavior modification, some of which have resulted in the death of camp participants. Supporters of the programs, however, maintain that they have had positive results with many youth.
—Fili Sagapolutele
