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State v. Driessen8/9/2004
t yard, which runs along Princess Kaiulani Boulevard. He saw Andrews in her car approaching the intersection. "So I saw her coming down, oh, okay, and next thing I heard was boom, and that's when I-wow, accident.... No, I didn't see it. I only heard it." Day immediately went over to Andrew's car and confirmed that she was all right. He then went over to the van to see if the man who had come out through the windshield was all right. "He said he was all right and then he said, 'She hit me.' " Day identified that man as Driessen. Day did not see anyone else present in the van, emerge from the van or leave the vicinity of the van. On cross-examination, Day confirmed that he did not see the accident and thus, did not see who was driving the van.
***2 Hawai'i County Police Department officer Daniel Freeman (Officer Freeman) testified that he was assigned to investigate the accident. When Officer Freeman arrived on the scene, another police officer was already there and pointed out Driessen as the driver of the van. Officer Freeman asked Driessen for his driver's license, but Driessen was unable to provide one. Officer Freeman described Driessen's demeanor: "He had red glassy bloodshot eyes, he staggered, unsteady on his feet. He had an odor emitting from his body that appeared to be of an alcoholic beverage."
Hawai'i County Police Department officer Mitchell Higashide (Officer Higashide) testified that he responded to the scene of the traffic accident. "And I saw this gentleman walking about in the area of the vehicle.... The van." Officer Higashide asked Driessen for his driver's documents, but Driessen could not produce any. Officer Higashide also ran checks on the van and discovered that its safety check had expired. Officer Higashide remembered that Andrews identified Driessen as the other person "involved in the traffic accident[.]"
Driessen was the only witness in his defense. He denied he was driving the van. He maintained, instead, that he was a passenger in the back of the van. Driessen, who lives in a house on Tiki Lane about a mile mauka of the accident site, remembered that a man named Wendell drove the van to his house that day. Driessen had met Wendell at some earlier time. "He's a guy I met down at the beach. I don't really know Wendell very well." Driessen had helped Wendell buy the van. He had seen the van for sale by the side of the road and had informed Wendell it was being offered.
Wendell arrived that day with beer. They started drinking. At some point, Driessen lay down in the back of the van and took a nap. Wendell decided to leave. "Well, I was just laying down in the back of the van and he took off so I went with him, yes." Wendell was speeding down Tiki Lane when the collision occurred. When the van stopped spinning around, Driessen crawled out through the windshield and went to check on Andrews. "When I came back Wendell was gone. He took off in the rocks." Driessen remembered that the police asked him to take the field sobriety test and some other tests. "He asked me to so I said, 'Okay, you know, sure,' but I told him I wasn't driving. I did what they told me to do."
On cross-examination, Driessen remembered that he first met Wendell a couple of days before the accident, and had not seen him since. He denied telling the investigating police officers that he formerly owned the van but had sold it to Wendell for $300, attributing the discrepancy to miscommunication. When asked whether he had told the police he was thrown through the windshield onto the street, Driessen initially claimed a lack of memory but ultimately concluded that he crawled out and ended up in the street. When asked whether he had told the police he first met Wendell when he picked him up hitchhiking that day, Driessen at first claime
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