In a case of mistaken identity, a man who was wrongfully arrested and detained at a Hawaiʻi state psychiatric hospital for two years is set to receive a $975,000 payout from the City and County of Honolulu.
Joshua Spriestersbach had been living on the street in 2017 when police arrested him for crimes committed by another man named Thomas Castleberry.
During two previous interactions, police misidentified Spriestersbach and then did not correct the record, according to a lawsuit Spriestersbach filed in 2021. Those errors led to the eventual 2017 arrest that resulted in his yearslong detention…