Katherine Kealoha’s Grandmother, 99, Finally Gets To Tell Her Story
Florence Puana is a key witness and alleged victim in one of Hawaii’s largest public corruption scandals.
It looks like 99-year-old Florence Puana will finally get the chance to testify against her own granddaughter Katherine Kealoha.
Puana is scheduled for a deposition April 30 with federal prosecutors who have charged Kealoha with a series of crimes, some of which she’s accused of perpetrating against Puana and her son, Gerard, who is Kealoha’s uncle.
The elder Puana recently fell ill and prosecutors said they wanted to memorialize her testimony in case she wasn’t available for Kealoha’s trial, which is scheduled to start next month.
Katherine Kealoha, a former deputy prosecutor for Honolulu, is accused by the U.S. Justice Department of framing Gerard Puana for the theft of her mailbox.
She allegedly enlisted the help of her husband, former Honolulu police chief Louis Kealoha and several of his officers — who also have been criminally charged — to help carry out the conspiracy.
According to the feds, the Kealohas wanted to silence Gerard Puana for filing a lawsuit against Katherine several months before the alleged mailbox theft that accused her of stealing hundreds of thousands of dollars from him and his mother.
The family spat has since led federal investigators to one of the largest public corruption scandals in Hawaii history.
In addition to the Kealohas, other public officials are the target of the Justice Department’s federal investigation, including Honolulu Prosecuting Attorney Keith Kanehsiro and Corporation Counsel Donna Leong, who is a top-level appointee in Mayor Kirk Caldwell’s cabinet.
