Feds track down
and nab alleged
rapist prison guard
Federal law enforcement agents have tracked down and arrested a former youth prison guard who had been indicted for alleged sexual assault of a teenage girl inmate in Kailua.
FBI agents arrested Lia Olione in American Samoa, charged him with unlawful flight to avoid prosecution and turned him over to state officials yesterday.
Investigators said Olione went to Samoa in July with his family after the state Attorney General's Office began investigating the allegation.
"Anyone -- anyone -- who commits a criminal offense against an incarcerated person will be brought to justice by our office," said Deputy Attorney General Kurt Spohn.
A state grand jury indictment filed on Sept. 16 alleges that Olione sexually assaulted the girl four times in June at the Hawaii Youth Correctional Facility. The victim was only identified as a girl between 14 and 16 years old. The indictment also charges Olione with holding the girl against her will and threatening her.
Olione faces 10 charges: three counts of kidnapping, four counts of first- and third-degree sexual assault, and one each of terroristic threatening, extortion and criminal solicitation. Olione is being held in lieu of $520,000 bail and scheduled for an initial appearance in Circuit Court at 8:30 a.m. Monday.
Last month, Gov. Linda Lingle replaced top management at the Kailua prison and ordered an investigation into charges that guards were terrorizing the male and female teenage inmates. The allegations came from a scathing report by the American Civil Liberties Union, which interviewed 70 teenage prisoners. Spohn said the investigation involving Olione began before the ACLU's report was released.
