CINDY ELLEN RUSSELL / CRUSSELL@STARBULLETIN.COM The police Ford Explorer, which was the second vehicle to respond to the scene, showed signs of damage as it sat parked at the Kailua Police Station yesterday.

Suspect shot
after HPD car hit

His condition is stable
and he faces charges for
attempted murder

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By Lisa Asato and Diana Leone
lasato@starbulletin.com dleone@starbulletin.com

Avis Apana had high hopes for her brother Byron Almeida when he was released from prison Tuesday.

Almeida, 30, had served 10 years in Halawa Correctional Facility for a robbery he admitted to when he was 20, she said.

Maybe he could finally get his life back together.

Instead, Almeida is in the Queen's Medical Center in stable condition after an officer shot him after he allegedly attacked two police officers with a 5-foot-long metal pipe at 2 a.m. yesterday.

HPD Byron Almeida: The shooting suspect is said to have chased police officers in their cars with a 5-foot-long pipe

Almeida was arrested at the hospital for the attempted murder of a police officer and other offenses.

If he is convicted of first-degree attempted murder, he could go back in prison for the rest of his life without the possibility of parole.

Apana said about 2 a.m. yesterday she woke to the sound of glass breaking in front of the home on Kalolina Street in Kailua that she shares with eight other family members.

Outside, she said, her brother, who had not been staying at the house, "was banging stuff, breaking things."

Almeida smashed out the rear window of her husband's Nissan, which was parked in front of the house, Apana said. "He was just standing there, swinging with a pipe in his hand."

"We was asking him what was going on and he wasn't answering," Apana said. "He was out of control. He was beyond talking."

Police were called and two officers arrived in separate vehicles, Honolulu Police Chief Lee Donohue said at a press conference yesterday.

Donohue referred to Almeida as the suspect and said he used a 5-foot-long pipe to smash the cars of the arriving officers.

The first officer, a 33-year-old man with 11 years of experience with the department, drove away.

But the suspect chased the officer's sport utility vehicle and continued hitting it with the pipe, Donohue said.

The second officer, a 36-year-old man with 12 years of police experience, arrived on scene and was also attacked.

The man broke the second officer's passenger-side window with the pipe "and then continued thrusting the pipe at the officer through the window, forcing the officer up against his seat and the car post," Donohue said.

CINDY ELLEN RUSSELL / CRUSSELL@STARBULLETIN.COM Police responded yesterday to reports that a man with a metal pipe was bashing objects at 619 Kalolina St., including the rear window of the car shown in the foreground. Police arrested the brother of a woman who lives in the house.

The suspect was ordered to stop, but would not, Donohue said. The officer fired two shots, hitting the suspect once.

"In a review of all the facts that we have in this case it appears that the shooting was justified by the officer, and we have no reason to believe otherwise," Donohue said.

DENNIS ODA / DODA@STARBULLETIN.COM Police Chief Lee Donohue talked to the press yesterday after the Kailua incident.

Almeida's mother, who asked not to be named, said that since getting out of prison her son was acting "like an animal."

Her son was chasing police with a pipe, the mother said. "The cops tried to stop him. They didn't do anything wrong."

The first officer on scene suffered minor injuries from broken glass, Donohue said. The second officer was not injured and is on administrative leave pending an investigation.

Donohue said testing would be done to see if the suspect was on drugs.

He said the latest shooting shows that Honolulu is a "large city and we have large city problems. The officers' job out here is much more complex, much more dangerous today than it was in the past."

Donohue said the suspect had 10 prior convictions, including two for assaulting police officers.

Halawa Correctional Facility confirmed yesterday that Almeida was released Tuesday.

His record there indicates he was serving time for charges of robbery, criminal property damage, assault and resisting arrest.

"He had maxed out his time. There was none left to serve," said Marian Tsuji, deputy director for corrections in the state Department of Public Safety.

Apana doesn't think her brother was on drugs, she said. "He just flipped. He's just been locked up too long, he didn't know how to deal with people. ... He was never like that before he went to prison."

"I hope someday what happened to him doesn't happen to other people," Apana said. "I think about all the people in prison who don't get help. ... I just hope they can give him some help."