A longtime Hawaii basketball figure was sentenced Wednesday to four years of probation and ordered to seek treatment for a gambling addiction.

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A longtime Hawaii basketball figure was sentenced Wednesday to four years of probation and ordered to seek treatment for a gambling addiction.

Hilo Circuit Judge Peter Kubota also sentenced 50-year-old Alika Smith — whose legal name is Justin Alika Pekelo Smith — to 250 hours of nonsports-related community service and a year in jail with credit for time served and the remainder put on hold, as long as Smith complies with conditions of his probation.

Smith, the former head boys’ basketball coach at Waiakea High School and a standout guard for the University of Hawaii at Manoa in the mid- to late-1990s, pleaded no contest to second-degree theft, a Class C felony punishable by up to five years in jail, and negotiating a worthless check, a misdemeanor carrying a maximum one-year jail sentence.

According to the state Department of the Attorney General, Smith pocketed funds intended to finance hotel arrangements for a preseason basketball team trip to pay his gambling debts.

The complaint states Smith in December 2022 arranged through Sports Travel Hawaii LLC hotel accommodations for the Waiakea boys’ basketball team at a cost of $3,788.75.

Smith collected $3,627 from the team members’ parents and kept the money for himself. According to the AG, Smith paid a deposit of $500 and allegedly wrote a check for the remainder of the balance owed Sports Travel, knowing the check would bounce, which it did.

At the sentencing hearing, which started on June 29 and finished Wednesday, Deputy Attorney General Thomas Michener asked Kubota to sentence Smith to 400 hours of community service. He also asked the judge to deny a deferred acceptance of Smith’s plea sought by the defense — which would erase Smith’s felony conviction from the record if he stays out of trouble during the deferral period.

“As far as the deferral, we don’t think the court can make the finding that the defendant’s not likely to engage in a criminal course of conduct again, because the continuous deception employed here to hold off the victim in Waiakea, the defendant’s financial situation — which provides possible motive for future crimes — and the fact that the defendant has a gambling problem that has not been addressed,” Michener told the court. “There’s no proof of treatment given to the probation office in the presentence investigation — nothing of any sort that shows what apparently got the defendant into this in the first place won’t get him into more trouble in the future.”

“What has been most painful for our community is the loss of trust,” Kalei Namohala, Waiakea’s athletic director, wrote in a letter read aloud in court by Michener. “Our student-athletes, their families and our staff look to their coaches as role models — individuals who represent integrity, discipline and leadership.

“His actions undermined those values and made it difficult for our students to reconcile the difference between what we teach and what they witnessed.”

Kalei Hanawahine of Sports Travel Hawaii said dealing with the theft and deception “took away some time from servicing our other clients.”

Kai McGuire, Smith’s attorney, told the court that his client apologizes for the time Sports Travel Hawaii “lost due to this misunderstanding.”

“They did get paid back by the school, and Mr. Smith paid back the school,” McGuire said, with the judge replying that the money was repaid — but by Smith’s mother, not Smith himself.

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McGuire asked the judge to sentence Smith to 200 hours of community service.

“Mr. Smith has basically devoted his life to the sport of basketball in his career as a college student and as a coach for decades now,” McGuire said. “He’s coached so many kids and shared their joy and the strength that kids can gain from the sport of basketball. He’s provided so much positive impact on the youth of our state and the athletes of our state … for such a long time.”

McGuire said Smith completed an online five-hour course about gambling addiction, and Kubota asked that the certificate to be sent to him and Smith’s probation officer.

“I’m not going to grant you the deferral up front, but I’ll consider it depending on how well you do on your community service and everything else,” Kubota told Smith during sentencing.

During sentencing, Kubota said he’s glad the money was repaid, even if it was by Smith’s mother, noting that in most theft cases, restitution is never made. He also ordered Smith to repay his mother.

“It’s not a no-harm, no-foul kind of situation, but the harm was remedied financially and fairly promptly,” the judge noted.

Kubota ordered Smith, who still coaches youth travel basketball, to stay away from gamblers and bookies, except in a treatment or Gamblers Anonymous-type of setting, and to stay out of casinos and sports books.

At UH, Smith started in the backcourt with NBA assistant coach and former player Anthony “AC” Carter, a pairing that then-ESPN hoops commentator Dick Vitale said was the best guard tandem in the nation.

In Hilo, Smith coached the Warriors boys’ team in 2022 after leading the Waiakea girls’ team to a pair of BIIF Division I runner-up finishes.

After UH and prior to his tenure on the Big Island, Smith helmed his high school alma mater, Kalaheo High School on Oahu — where he played for his father, the late legendary coach Pete Smith — to three state championships in his five years as the Mustangs’ boys head coach.

“I look at you as a past Rainbow Warriors star player — and the thing that hurts everybody here is that you messed up,” Kubota told Smith. “And there are a lot of young people in all your programs, or just fans around that look at you and are disappointed.

“But you know what? People screw up in life. You make mistakes, you got to kala mai and own it … ,” the judge concluded, invoking the Hawaiian term for asking forgiveness. “And that’s what I’m expecting you to do.”

After the sentencing, McGuire reiterated the case arose out of “an unfortunate misunderstanding.”

“As soon as Mr. Smith realized his mistake, he did everything in his power to correct it,” McGuire said.

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Email John Burnett at [email protected].