A doctor accused of trying to push his wife off a hiking trail and hitting her with a rock this week has been charged with second-degree attempted murder, Honolulu police said on Wednesday.
Dr. Gerhardt Konig, a 46-year-old anesthesiologist, is being held on a $5 million bond in connection with the Monday incident, the Honolulu Police Department said. It is not immediately clear if he had entered a plea for the attempted murder in the second-degree charge or if he has retained a lawyer.
In a Wednesday statement, police say Konig was hiking with his wife at the Pali Puka hiking trail in Honolulu when he “attempted to push her off the trail and then struck her multiple times to her head with a rock.” Authorities responded to a report of a male beating a female on the trail and transported a 36-year-old woman in critical condition to a local hospital. Two witnesses also called 911 and assisted in this investigation, police added.
Police said that Konig, who was identified as the victim’s husband, fled the scene prior to the police’s arrival. About eight hours after the 911 call, and “after a brief foot pursuit,” Konig was arrested.
As of Thursday morning, Konig still had his license to practice medicine in Hawaii. His original license dates to Sept. 27, 2022.
According to his LinkedIn profile, Konig is currently a partner at an anesthesia medical group in Maui. Prior to that, he was a professor and clinical instructor at the University of Pittsburgh.
The University of Pittsburgh and his employer in Maui did not immediately respond to NBC’s request for comment.
Konig’s wife currently works as a project manager at TerraPower, a nuclear reactor design and development engineering company founded by Bill Gates, her LinkedIn account says. She attained her bachelor’s degree in nuclear engineering from Penn State and later her MBA from Pitt, her LinkedIn account shows.
According to Konig’s Facebook profile, the pair married in 2018 and got engaged within the year prior.
