By TOM CALLIS
By TOM CALLIS
Tribune-Herald staff writer
Faavae E. Tuinei heard testimony Thursday from a girl and woman he allegedly recorded with a cell phone while they were using public restrooms.
The 35-year-old Hilo man, who remains in custody on $20,000 bail, has been charged with two counts of invasion of privacy.
The two victims, ages 13 and 24, said during a preliminary hearing in District Court that they were horrified to see a phone peering up at them from under a stall partition last Saturday.
The crimes took place in Hilo at the Afook-Chinen Civic Auditorium and Puainako Town Center.
“I reached over for toilet paper, and I saw a phone slip under the stall,” the woman said. “I screamed.”
The Tribune-Herald is withholding the victims’ names due to the nature of the allegations.
Detective Grant Todd said police seized the phone after receiving a search warrant. It contained a video recording of a female using the restroom, he said, adding that it also showed Tuinei’s face.
After seeing the phone, the woman notified two men, Mathew Bailey and Lance Orita, at the civic auditorium who went into the restroom to confront the man.
Orita, 33, testified that the occupant of the stall, whom he identified as Tuinei, pushed back against the stall door when they tried to open it.
They later confronted Tuinei outside the restroom.
Orita said that Tuinei only mumbled to them when asked what he was doing.
Tuinei had a Samoan translator present at the hearing, indicating that he doesn’t fully understand English.
About an hour later, police say, Tuinei used the phone again, this time on a girl using a restroom at the shopping center.
The girl, who appeared uncomfortable recalling the incident, said she also saw the phone being held by a man underneath the stall’s partition.
Her cousin told the court her boyfriend chased Tuinei from the restroom.
The cousin’s boyfriend, Laimana Mauga, initially identified by police as the girl’s uncle, then allegedly assaulted Tuinei.
Mauga, who police say physically restrained Tuinei with the help of two others, did not testify Thursday because of the possibility of an assault charge being filed against him. Judge Barbara Takase committed Tuinei’s case to 3rd Circuit Court.
His next court appearance will be April 19.
Email Tom Callis at tcallis@hawaiitribune-herald.com.