|
Another vehicle
stolen with
baby on board
The 4-month-old is found
safe after she is left in a running
automobile by her mother
For the second time in four months, a vehicle left running with an infant inside was stolen yesterday, then later recovered with the baby uninjured.
At about 2:27 p.m. a woman left her 4-month-old baby girl in a gold pickup truck -- with the air condition on -- outside a 7-Eleven near the intersection of Nuuanu Avenue and North Kuakini Street. Police said that while the woman was in the convenience store, a heavy-set man in his 20s, whom police were still looking for last night, drove away with the infant in the back seat.
The incident set off the state's first-ever MAILE-AMBER alert, which sent information on the stolen vehicle and its possible whereabouts over the airwaves, television stations and Internet.
Less than an hour after the truck was stolen, it was found with the baby still inside in the parking lot of Red Hill's First Assembly of God on Moanalua Road by a DHL delivery driver. The driver had been notified of the alert -- along with the company's other drivers -- through his dispatcher.
The DHL driver declined to speak to the media, but police said that the man was making a package drop at the church when he noticed a truck that fit the description of the one that was stolen. He blocked in the vehicle with his truck, checked the stolen pickup's license plate to make sure it was a match and then called 911, said Maj. Susan Ballard, commander of the Honolulu Police Department's Kalihi District.
The truck was found about an hour later, with the baby safely inside, in the parking lot of the First Assembly of God Church on Moanalua Road. Police are searching for the perpetrator.
They also gathered fingerprints from the stolen vehicle.
Witnesses described the suspect as about 5 feet 10 inches tall and weighing about 200 pounds. He has short hair and was seen wearing a dark, long-sleeve shirt and denim shorts down to the knee.
Ballard said the mother of the infant, who was crying and "extremely distraught," arrived at the church shortly after the car was found.
The baby was taken to Kapiolani Medical Center at Pali Momi as a precaution and released within an hour. The parents declined to speak to the media yesterday.
Charlene Takeno, director of the Missing Child Center of Hawaii, said yesterday's first run of the MAILE-AMBER alert went well, especially given that DHL and other companies with road crews were able to get information to their drivers quickly.
Yesterday's incident set off the state's first-ever MAILE- AMBER alert, which sent information on the stolen vehicle over the airwaves, TV stations and Internet. In February, signage over the H-1 freeway was tested. Yesterday, the baby was found before the alert was posted on highway signs.
The infant, she said, was found before the alert could be posted on highway signs. Meanwhile, getting information out to different agencies proved more difficult than expected.
"Every agency has different processes" for getting the word out, she said. "All in all, it worked out pretty well. The main thing is that the child was recovered."
Takeno also said she was surprised to hear yesterday's case involved an infant left in a running car, given a similar incident March 29 that was widely publicized by the media.
In that case, 26-year-old Tema Tanu Tema is accused of stealing a car with its air conditioning on outside the Golden Coin restaurant in Liliha.
A 5-month-old infant was in the car's back seat, and the vehicle and baby were recovered less than an hour later.
Earlier this year, lawmakers considered a bill that would have made it a crime to leave a child under age 9 unattended in a car. House Bill 289, though, was deferred by a state House committee in February.
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