Store owner,
robber clash;
wife is shot

The owner restrains one
man for police, and another
is being sought

By Rod Ohira
Star-Bulletin

At 9:30 last night, Paul Fithian was alone and behind the cash register of the small Wahiawa convenience store where his wife had been shot in the face during a robbery attempt four hours earlier.

"She's critical; that's all I know," the 52-year-old owner of California Market at 404 California Ave. said while walking toward the front door, trying to avoid broken glass and a thick pool of blood on the floor in front of the register.

"I'm going to see her now."

The man who allegedly shot Pok Cha Fithian as she entered the store was scuffling with her husband on the floor near the register when the gun was fired, Detective Nick Cambra said.

The bullet entered near her lower jaw and came out at the back of her neck, Cambra added.

"I don't know much," Fithian said of the incident. "The guy came in with a gun and said: 'This is a robbery. Give me the money.' "

Fithian, who had been robbed once before at gunpoint, confronted the robber.

"I don't know if it was pure instinct or stupidity," he said.

Realizing his wife had been shot, Fithian rushed to her side.

The suspect allegedly tried to shoot Fithian as he walked away from him, according to Cambra.

"He pulled the trigger two or three times, but the gun was jammed," Cambra said.

Fithian confronted the suspect again and was able to hold him until police arrived.

Fithian suffered several cuts on his head and forehead from being struck with the gun, Cambra said. He was treated at Wahiawa Hospital and released.

The suspect, a 20-year-old Kahuku man who has a prior felony conviction, had a deep glass cut on the back of his head and other facial injuries. He also complained of knee pain.

The suspect was released from Wahiawa Hospital and booked for first-degree robbery and two counts of attempted murder at 9:25 p.m.

Police recovered a 9 mm semiautomatic handgun at the scene. Cambra said at least two shots were fired.

Tina Tali, a waitress at Seoul Inn, next door to Fithian's store, said she heard two shots, "but I thought they were firecrackers."

"When I went outside (to check), I saw a woman holding a cloth to her face," she said. "There was lots of blood."

Pok Cha Fithian was transported by ambulance to the Wheeler Army airfield and flown by helicopter to Queen's Hospital, where she remains in critical condition.

Police are looking for a second suspect, described as an Asian man about 17 to 18 years old, who fled the scene after the shooting.