Tips help put fugitive in police custody
Alert motorists spot the man near the Likelike Highway
Tips from passing motorists led to the capture of an escaped Hawaii State Hospital patient near the Kaneohe-bound lanes of the Likelike Highway near the H-3 overpass.
Adonis Oandasan, 36, was arrested about 5:45 p.m. and was taken into custody at the Kaneohe police substation last night.
Oandasan, who has a history of slashing tires, escaped from the Hawaii State Hospital's garden area where he had been working with a machete at about 1 p.m. Thursday.
No one actually saw him leave but hospital staff could not find him on the property, police said.
Hospital staff also told police he had not taken his medications for "a couple of weeks."
Police said he had an 8-inch knife in his backpack when he was caught, but no machete. He did not resist arrest.
Police said Oandasan was caught after dozens of sightings were reported over the last few days. Many of the sightings were situated along Likelike Highway, police said.
Oandasan was charged in 2004 with slashing the tires of dozens of vehicles on the Big Island, causing an estimated $3,188 in damage.
He was transferred to the state hospital in June.
State Health Department spokeswoman Janice Okubo has said that Oandasan was allowed to work in the garden for therapy.
Ten patients at the state hospital have escaped so far this year -- as many as in all of 2003, Okubo has said. In 1997, there were 49 escapes and 21 people escaped in 1999.
Police said Oandasan will remain in police custody for now.