You’ll recall that last month, a famous 20-year-old YouTube video publisher from Alabama was arrested in Honolulu when she broke quarantine following her arrival in Hawaii. Mika Salamanca traveled to Honolulu early in July and was seen four days later brazenly out in public. We hadn’t given this much thought, until looking at it again this morning and wondering if justice was best served.
Going rogue, Mika Salamanca published social media videos from Honolulu’s City Nails, Ala Moana Shopping Center (pictured above), at a nearby Korean restaurant, and when hiking in Lanikai. These videos, available to her millions of followers, were brought to the attention of the Hawaii Tourism Authority. The matter was then turned over to the State Attorney General, after which Salamanca was arrested. Salamanca first claimed she was advised by law enforcement she could go out in public so long as she had a negative C0vid test. Attorney General Clare Connors said that was incorrect and that her having, “so many followers makes her actions that much more dangerous…”
Potential $5,000 fine and a year in prison reduced to $575 and 6 months probation.
She was originally released on $2,000 bail. Mika Salamanca subsequently agreed to and has now issued a PSA on her social media accounts. She apologized per a state-approved script. As a result, her fine has been reduced to $575, she is on probation for 6 months and has agreed not to return to Hawaii at this time. As an interesting side note, this is not the first time we have heard of penalties for these violations being greatly reduced or dropped entirely.
One of the infamous videos still online.
https://youtu.be/iFqjZK_geaE
PSA apology video.
The video below is in Tagalog as Mika has over 2 million subscribers largely in the Philippines. In it, she said (per Google Translate) “I admit that was a big mistake so I apologize to all of you my followers and the people of Hawaii… I admit in front of the court my mistake so I was given the opportunity to clear my name… I hope you understand me and I’m sorry for everything I did.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1DA9436drzo
What’s your take?
Was justice best served in the way this is being handled? We’re not sure ourselves and look forward to hearing your thoughts.
Aloha Rob and Jeff,
What’s most disturbing (to me) is reading posts by those who are proposing she should do jail time. All the while, States (Hawaii Included) are letting Criminals OUT of Jails/Prisons to go and commit more heinous crimes! This is a very slippery slope being created, and if this mentality continues, we are doomed as a Republic.
For Hawaii, these are Ige’s “Emergency Mandates”, which are not laws, as they were NOT voted on/in by the State Legislature, who was elected “by the people, for the people”. And, these orders are already pushing (some other States exceeding) the boundaries of our Constitutional Rights. In itself, what’s being done is borderline criminal, as we are technically being held hostage by these States (definitely debatable). Plus, it’s all based on insufficient, scientific evidence that Covid 19 is as deadly as originally thought. Yet here, some people are practically Demanding that She should do jail time, Seriously?! Those of you who feel this way, need a “check up from the neck up” and, you clearly need to snap out of this hypnotic MSM trance…😳
She was tested, apparently she was negative, and the State of Hawaii (nearly 6 months later) should have already established a policy in place to protect those who have tested negative, for travel purposes. It’s a blatant lack of decisive management within Governments that has caused this! It’s ironic that they actually did the right thing (this time), and some of you are out with your pitchforks, metaphorically, calling for her head on a platter, and honestly, that’s just whacked! 😞
Sure, she could have handled it better, but it’s this kind of Socialistic (in my opinion, half-crazed) mentality that will be the downfall of the individual freedoms that this Country was founded on. It’s a bit disheartening, and a real eye opener, to see how easily people have been molded into a socialist mentality, over the last few decades…
Mahalo You two!
Hi Jim.
Thank you.
Aloha.
Evidently you have not lost friends or loved ones. The “jail time” debate is a distraction. These health mandates are not intended foremost to protect a headstrong young woman from herself, but primarily to prevent her from harming other people whose safety was clearly unimportant to her.
Are the following governmental obligations also socialistic, half-crazed, unconstitutional: seatbelts, child car seats, motorcycle helmets, speed limits and stop signs?
More than 200,00 people have died in the US, alone. These emergency mandates reflect our moral obligations to each other.
Losing friends and loved ones is one of the things we all share. Not a good stick to wave in a discussion.
Aloha John,
Couldn’t have said it better myself…
Aloha Kaio,
I’ve lost dozens of friends and family to many things, just to clarify your inaccurate, presumptive analysis of my life.
People like you don’t seem to grasp that she had anegative test result, and she, in no way (None, Zero, Nada) was harming anyone. You aren’t grasping that this is far beyond senselessly punishing a healthy young woman, who didn’t have the disease to spread.
The “distraction” is
people like you trying to justify the actions of this inept Government, from their lack of progress in solving the problems that have arisen over the last 6 months. Hmmm, I find it interesting that you inflated the death count to 200k, when it just reached 171k, which, in itself, is still questionable, but I digress.
Exactly how do you rationalize using the number of deaths (for this disease), when the death rate is miniscule compared to many other diseases and forms of death, not only in this country but around the world? It’s even more asanine using these deaths to justify these ”mandates”, which aren’t even laws, voted in by our constituents, when the actual scientific data doesn’t support the original death rate projections to continue them, in their current form.
On top of that, you senselessly compare executive mandates to state and/or federal laws that were actually voted on by legislation??? 🤷♂️ Comparing apples and oranges isn’t an intelligent way to justify your point. It makes you look like an…well, let’s just say, it makes you look like a politician. 😂🤙
Seriously who cares, they’re so many other issues to be dealt with why waste time on this individual.
I wouldn’t have let her do a PSA it feeds right into what these YouTube celebrities want. The PSA validates her celebrity and frankly before reading this article I didn’t know who this fake celebrity was.
The best move would have been when caught to hustle her over to the airport and put her on the first flight off the island. I’m not talking home, but the first flight to anywhere now that would send a message.
The CCP does that, don’t they? Read a script on television admitting the fundamentally sinful nature of people and praising the strength and wisdom of the state. The only thing missing is the firing squad.
Not a good look for the home of aloha.
Please, shut down your beloved islands! That way no one will come, you will get what so many seem to want, which is complete isolation and separation from us low life mainlanders! Then? You’ll be left with social breakdown, even more lawlessness, serious crime, spikes in murder because, people will only stand by and take the heavy hand of government so long! Those of you who seem to think that the Hawaiian islands are so much more special than just about anywhere else on earth only create division and pride! So, when we all act and behave like petulant children on a blog, and think that our home is so much better than than anywhere else, we deserve the destruction, plague, Virus that comes.
Lock down please so I can be refunded!
JW
Weird.
And let us hope that neither you or one you love is driven to suicide or hopeless drug addiction as a result of the needless destruction of our local and the global economy. It is commonly acknowledged by those who study such things that the excess mortality that will result as a result of this foolish lockdown will far in exceed the excess mortality that will directly result from the Covid-19 pandemic. And while the victims of Covid-19 will be overwhelmingly the very old or infirm those that have thritlives cut short or blighted as a result of global economic collapse will be the very young and others in their prime years. Which is not to say depending on how long the economic devastation lasts that the old and infirm will not be affected as well.
Is this truly the world we want to live in? Where people are not free? In my opinion we don’t quarantine healthy people. My 3 cents. These are slippery slopes for a microbe with a 99.74% recovery rate. Peace.