StarBulletin.com

Salon workers pursue duo that stole their van


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POSTED: Thursday, July 09, 2009

It looked like a chase scene from an action film: An Aiea hair salon owner and her “;girls”; chased down two vehicle-theft suspects Tuesday, recovering a stolen minivan and netting two arrests.

Shortly after noon, Desire Salon & Spa owner Tara Madijanon pulled up in her minivan to drop off a few things at her salon at 98-064 Kamehameha Highway.

Madijanon asked skin-care specialist Jennie Honda to keep an eye on the van, which was left running. Honda, 29, noticed two men seated in the van and went out to confront them.

“;She is a real beautiful, petite young lady, and here she is pounding and yelling to get out of the van,”; said Madijanon.

When the van sped off, Madijanon kicked off her high heels and ran barefoot after it, catching up and clinging to it by the rear windshield wiper blade.

The men stopped at a red light and jumped the curb onto the sidewalk. That's when Madijanon flung open the passenger door.

“;I just ripped his arm ... pushed him and flung him out,”; she said yesterday.

Madijanon said she had one of the men in her hands, who asked, “;What the f—— are you doing?”;

“;I said, 'What are you doing stealing my van?... You're going to jail.'

“;I was literally on top of him ... wrestling him,”; she said. “;I'm not a tiny lady, but I'm not a kung fu ninja.”;

The men fled, but her 44-year-old business partner and cosmetologist Vera Close outran them in her bare feet and chased them into some apartment complexes. She threw a full soda bottle at one of them, striking him in the back of the head.

“;She was all dolled up, makeup and jewelry, hauling butt and jumping fences,”; said Madijanon.

Police arrested two men in the area of Kanuku Place and Moanalua Loop, where they ran onto the roof of a building and slid down a pillar, police said.