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Police seek A manhunt was underway this morning for a suspect who apparently eluded police during a four-hour standoff at a Nuuanu Ave. apartment.
man after Nuuanu
apartment siege
A woman thought to have
been held hostage was freed
By Leila Fujimori
Star-BulletinA woman came out of the apartment this morning at about 10:30 a.m. But when police went in, they discovered the suspect had left before Specialized Services Division officers arrived.
The woman, Marilyn Francis, told reporters she had not been harmed. “I don't know what's going on. The SWAT just came,” she said, referring to the Specialized Services Division officers who surrounded the apartment.
The 34-unit Nuuanu Garden Apartments were evacuated as Specialized Services Division officers converged around a ground-floor unit located at the rear of the complex.
Three schools in the vicinity -- Hongwanji Mission School, Cathedral Catholic School and Kawananakoa Middle School -- were under lockdown and students were kept in classrooms as a precaution.
Police received a dropped 911 call from the apartment at 1710 Nuuanu Ave. at about 6:30 a.m. When dispatchers returned the call, the woman whispered that she couldn’t talk right now and there was fear in her voice, police said.
The male suspect in his 20s was wanted for terroristic threatening and kidnapping in connection with an incident on New Year’s Day involving the woman. Police were also looking for the suspect on a “retake warrant” to bring him back to prison.
Police said the suspect may be armed with a pistol or handgun and is considered dangerous.
Jerry Sloan, manager of the apartment building, said the suspect was not a tenant, but was an acquaintance with the woman who rents Apartment 5-C .
He said he saw the man at the apartment last night, fixing the woman’s car.
Officers diverted traffic around the immediate area during the standoff.
Hongwanji Mission School is only three or four buildings away from the building where the hostage situation was happening.
Teddi Yagi, vice principal at the 300-student school, said the gates to the campus and doors to classrooms were closed since about 8:15 a.m.
Students range in age from 3 to 13. Yagi said older students are a “a little bit curious and excited” while younger ones are being given as little information as possible so they don't get worried.
A message was sent to Oahu radio stations urging parents not to show up at the campus to pick up the children, Yagi said.
Shortly before 11 a.m., Yagi and her staff were huddling to determine what to do about lunchtime for the students.
Both Yagi and Richard Anbe, principal of 840-student Kawananakoa Middle School, said they've had experience with being under a lockdown before.
The day of the Xerox shootings, police told the schools to go under lockdown because of the possibility that killer Byran Uyesugi would try to reach his home in upper Nuuanu.
The edge of Kawananakoa was about 100 yards away from the hostage situation, across Kuakini Street.
Star-Bulletin reporter Gordon Y.K. Pang and
the Associated Press contributed to this story.