The president of the University of Hawaii system declined to say whether he was drinking at a New Year’s Eve dinner before he hit a parked car and flipped his 2021 Toyota Rav4 early Monday.
David K. Lassner, 69, the 15th president of UH’s 10-campus system, was not administered a breathalyzer test after he veered right to avoid oncoming traffic and hit the parked car while on his way home from dinner.
He was not hurt, neither was anyone else, and he refused treatment from Emergency Medical Services technicians at about 1 a.m. on Edna Street.
The Honolulu Star-Advertiser requested a copy of the HPD motor vehicle collision report and the body-worn camera footage from the HPD patrol officers who spoke to Lassner after the accident.
No determination has been made on whether Lassner’s car was totaled.
The Star-Advertiser asked Lassner, who has led the university for more than a decade, whether he was drinking and how much before what university officials described as a “minor collision with a parked car that flipped his car onto its side.” Lassner, through a spokesperson, declined to say.
“Police at the scene determined that a (sobriety) test was not necessary and that is the most relevant fact. Police are highly trained for situations that might possibly involve impaired driving. I am respectfully declining to answer your specific questions on what he did on his personal time and when as it has no bearing on the motor vehicle accident. Again, that is according to the police,” UH spokesperson Dan Meisenzahl said in a written statement.
On Monday, Lassner was helped out of his vehicle through the rear hatch of the car.
UH officials said Lassner, who has led UH’s campus system for a decade, “spoke to police and was examined by paramedics at the scene. He was coordinated and coherent, and was not given a breathalyzer test.”
Lassner has paid fines for three traffic offenses since 1999.
In November 2018 he paid a $97 fine for disregarding a stop sign. He also paid a $97 fine in April 2005 for failing to obey lane direction and control signals. In June 1999 he paid a $42 fine for not obeying a traffic control device at an intersection.
Lassner began working at UH in entry-level roles in information technology in 1977, according to his UH bio.
He would become UH’s first chief information officer and then its first vice president for IT.
Lassner was appointed interim president in September 2013, and the “interim” tag was dropped in June 2014.
