On January 20, anti-fascist demonstrators and fans of the now-reviled Milo Yiannopoulos clashed outside the University of Washington's Kane Hall. Elizabeth Hokoana, 29, allegedly shot Josh Dukes, a protestor, in the abdomen during the clash. She claimed she fired the gun out of fear for her husband's life.
Today, King County prosecutors charged Hokoana with first-degree assault "with a firearm enhancement," The Seattle Times reports. Her husband, Marc Hokoana, 29, was charged with third-degree assault "for allegedly using pepper-spray in the crowd just before the shooting."
In court documents, prosecutors said the shooting āwas not an impulsive act done in a moment of fear.ā
Evidence in the charging papers ādemonstrates that the defendants went to the event at the UW campus with the intent to provoke altercations with protesters who they knew would be at this controversial event,ā wrote Senior Deputy Prosecutor Mary Barbosa.
āThe defendants created a situation designed to allow Elizabeth Hokoana to shoot the victim in the middle of an extremely crowded event under the guise of defending her or her husband,ā Barbosa wrote.
In the Hokoanas' charging documents, officials with the University of Washington Police Department wrote that they obtained a warrant to search Marc's Facebook page. Here's what they found:
On January 19, 2017 Marc HOKOANA and [REDACTED] sent messages back and forth thru their Facebook accounts. At approximately 11:31 am Marc HOKOANA sent a message to [REDACTED] stating āI canāt wait for tomorrow, Iām going to the Milo event and if the snowflakes get out off hand Iām just going to wade through their ranks and start cracking skulls.ā [REDACTED] responded ā[REDACTED] do itā. At approximately 11:36 [REDACTED] asked Marc HOKOANA over Facebook āGod you gonna carry?ā. Mar responded āNah, Iām going full meleeā. Marc followed up with the comment āLily itāsā and shortly stated āIs*ā, [REDACTED] replied by saying āGET EMā and followed up with ājust donāt end up in jailā. It was later learned that Elizabeth HOKOANA goes by āLily.ā
In a joint statement provided to the Times, the Hokoanas' attorneys said that they "look forward to presenting our case to a jury and we anticipate an acquittal."