A 30-year-old Hilo man accused of the fatal shooting Dec. 18 of a Puainako Center employee at the Hilo shopping mall pleaded not guilty Wednesday to numerous offenses.
After entering the pleas before Hilo Circuit Judge Peter Kubota, defense attorney Stanton Oshiro requested and was granted a court-appointed mental examination for his client, Jarvis Rockwell Hung Leung Boots, with no objection by Deputy Prosecutor Kimberly Angay.
Kubota scheduled a Sept. 17 hearing about the reports of the three mental health professionals assigned to examine Boots.
A grand jury on June 9 returned an 18-count indictment charging Boots with second-degree murder, two counts of attempted first-degree murder, two counts each of attempted second-degree murder and terroristic threatening, possession of drug paraphernalia, and numerous firearm offenses.
Boots appeared via videoconference from Hawaii Community Correctional Center — where he’s being held without bail — because of a COVID-19 outbreak at the Hilo jail.
Oshiro told the judge he’ll file a motion requesting bail for Boots at a later date.
The victim in the Puainako shooting was 41-year-old Benjamin Davidson, a father of three.
Some of the charges Boots faces are connected with a Dec. 2 incident in which a 24-year-old man, Anthony Moniz, was shot twice while salvaging parts from a “burnt shell of a car on the side of ” Old Mamalahoa Highway, according to police.
Moniz was taken to Hilo Medical Center in critical condition for his injuries, which included multiple gunshot wounds to the extremities and torso, a rupture of his iliac artery in his pelvis, nerve injuries, a pelvic bone fracture, and other internal injuries.
Despite his injuries, Moniz on Dec. 18 identified Boots out of a lineup as the shooter, police said.
Another man, 50-year-old Juan Lopez, whom police said rode to the scene on a John Deere Gator utility vehicle after hearing gunshots, reported he also was shot at but uninjured.
Second-degree murder carries a mandatory sentence of life imprisonment, with the possibility of parole, upon conviction. A conviction for attempted first-degree murder carries a mandatory sentence of life without the possibility of parole.
Email John Burnett at jburnett@hawaiitribune-herald.com.
