The Maui News

WAILUKU — A Waiehu woman testified she was walking home when she was attacked by a stranger who grabbed and punched her and pinned her to the ground.

At a preliminary hearing Wednesday in Wailuku District Court, she identified her attacker as Dalton Mata, 19, of Wailuku.

The attack occurred at about 9 p.m. June 14 when the 19-year-old victim said she was walking home near Waiehu Beach Road and Makaala Drive after taking the bus from her job in Lahaina.

She said she got a “weird vibe” and turned around and saw someone behind her.

“He grabbed me,” she said. “I told him to stop, back off.”

The two were pushing each other before she lost her footing and fell.

“My face was being shoved into the ground,” she said.

The woman said she was hit in the back of her head before her attacker got off her and ran. She said she thought Mata ran off because someone had come out to see what was going on.

After finding her cellphone, she said she called a friend and asked him to pick her up “because I got attacked and I was afraid.”

She had ended the call and was squatting on the ground when she looked over her right shoulder and saw her attacker had returned, the woman said.

As he began walking toward her, the woman said she jumped up.

“He grabbed me again,” she said. “We were pushing each other again, and then I ended up on the ground.”

She was lying on her back with Mata on top of her when he pinned her arms to the ground, she said.

“I was just screaming, ‘Please stop, don’t do this, please,’ ” she said.

She said Mata hit her in her right eye, which was blackened.

“He struck me right before he said, ‘Kiss me or I’ll kill you,’ ” she said.

The woman said Mata kissed her and she felt his hand going down under her jeans shorts, with his fingertips reaching a little past her belly button. She said she grabbed his hand and pulled it out of her shorts.

“What was going through your mind?” Deputy Prosecutor Karen Droscoski asked.

“That I was possibly going to die,” the woman replied.

When two vehicles showed up, Mata ran, the woman said.

A resident of Hale Mahaolu Ekolu on Makaala Drive testified she woke up after hearing screaming at about 9 p.m. June 14. The resident said she ran out her back door and saw a girl screaming and “this guy punching her.”

The resident identified Mata as the one she saw that night.

Judge Blaine Kobayashi found there was sufficient evidence to support probable cause for felony charges of kidnapping and attempted third-degree sexual assault against Mata.

He is also charged with third-degree assault and second-degree terroristic threatening.

Droscoski asked that bail be increased for Mata in the “unprovoked attack on an innocent 19-year-old girl.”

Kobayashi denied the request, keeping bail at $40,400 for Mata. He posted a bond to be released, court records show.

Mata was ordered to stay away from the victim and Hale Mahaolu Ekolu. He also was ordered not to consume alcohol or illegal drugs and to report for random drug testing.

He is scheduled to be arraigned July 3 in 2nd Circuit Court.