A Hilo attorney pleaded not guilty Thursday to first-degree theft and second-degree forgery in connection with a narrow piece of land containing an easement road in lower Puna.
Acting Hilo Circuit Judge Darien Ching Nagata ordered 73-year-old Paul J. Sulla to appear for trial at 9 a.m. May 4, 2020.
Sulla was indicted Dec. 4 by a Hilo grand jury.
The indictment states on or about Sept. 6, 2016, Sulla “falsely made, completed, endorsed or altered” a deed.
It also states Sulla and Halai Heights LLC, “as part of one scheme and/or a continuing course of conduct, intentionally obtained or exerted control over … a parcel of real estate … belonging to Leonard G. Horowitz and/or the Royal Bloodline of David, by deception,” with intent to deprive them of the property.
Halai Heights LLC is listed on the Department of Commerce and Consumer Affairs website as a “real estate property management” company, with Sulla listed as manager. Sulla has disclosed in open court that the other member of Halai Heights is Jason Hester.
Horowitz, 67, a former dentist whose website describes him as a “clinician, prophet, scholar and natural healer,” has been involved in several civil lawsuits against Sulla and/or Hester, as an appellant and a respondent, for more than a decade, and accuses the lawyer of — among other things — impropriety in connection with the nonjudicial foreclosure process.
Earlier this month, Horowitz told the Tribune-Herald Sulla stole the easement property because it provided the only access to a more valuable adjacent property with a “coveted steam vent and geothermal warm pools.”
The civil lawsuits are in connection with two other properties, as the easement property, including the one with the steam vent and warm pools referred to by Horowitz.
Attorney Brian De Lima, who represents both Sulla and Halai Heights LLC, said Sulla has been practicing law for 47 years and is “not guilty of these allegations.”
“Had he known this matter was going before the grand jury, he would have asked to testify before the grand jury to clear up any matters,” De Lima told the Tribune-Herald. “Because it’s our position that, unfortunately, whatever was presented before the grand jury — and we’ll get a copy of the grand jury transcript — it’s clear they had not been provided or explained the documents that relate to this transaction. Because if they were provided that information, they would see that the legal descriptions (of the property) were all provided from prior title searches of the property and not something that Mr. Sulla created on his own.”
First-degree theft is a Class B felony punishable by up to 10 years imprisonment upon conviction, and second-degree forgery is a Class C felony punishable by up to five years imprisonment upon conviction.
Email John Burnett at jburnett@hawaiitribune-herald.com.