FL MORRIS / FMORRIS@STARBULLETIN.COM Police investigated an apparent murder-suicide last night at 99-801 Halawa Heights Road.

Police suspect murder-suicide

Neighbors hear an argument before a man and his wife are found dead in Halawa

A 60-year-old man and 45-year-old woman died of gunshot wounds in an apparent murder-suicide last night at a two-story walk-up apartment on Halawa Heights Road.

Emergency Medical Services officials said the man and woman were pronounced dead at the second-floor apartment at 99-801 Halawa Heights Road at about 8:25 p.m.

Police said a call to 911 from that address was dropped after 6:30 p.m. Neighbors said the two were married.

Police entered the apartment through a rear window and said they found a 9 mm semiautomatic pistol on the man's chest.

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FL MORRIS / FMORRIS@STARBULLETIN.COM Police were on the scene of a murder-suicide last night at 99-801 Halawa Heights Road, next to Halawa Heights Market.

Police and the city Medical Examiner's office today continued investigating the apparent murder-suicide of a married couple last night in Halawa Heights.

Officers responded at 6:39 p.m. to a dropped 911 call at 99-801 Halawa Heights Road, unit 4, and heard nothing but the sound of a disconnected phone.

Officers entered the second-story apartment through a back window and found a man and woman in their bed dead of gunshot wounds, said Maj. Dave Kajihiro. Police later confirmed they were married.

Police said the man was 60 years old and the woman, whom they are calling the victim, was 45. Police said the man had a 9 mm semiautomatic handgun atop his chest.

Neighbors said they heard arguing and a gunshot.

Although police believe it may have been a murder-suicide, the case has not been classified as such until the investigation is completed, said Lt. Bill Kato of the homicide detail.

"The direction of the investigation will hinge on the autopsy and further lab tests," Kato said. He added that investigators must examine gunshot residue on the bodies.

Autopsies on the couple were scheduled for today. The city Medical Examiner's Office had not yet released their names this morning.

Police said today they have located the woman's 18-year-old daughter, whom they were looking for last night to make sure she was OK. Investigators found her safe. Police said she was not living with her mother and stepfather.

An city Emergency Medical Services official said the man and woman were pronounced dead at the scene at 8:25 p.m.

The two-story walk-up apartment is above Halawa Heights Market near the corner of Halawa Heights Road and Halawa Drive.

Stanley Alvarez, 54, who lives in the apartment complex, said he was sitting outside smoking a cigarette and heard loud arguing.

When he went back inside his apartment, "all I heard was one gunshot," so he ran outside to investigate.

"It happened real fast," Alvarez said. "I came running outside ... I thought it was a robbery."

Another neighbor, Dave Maxilom, 39, said he heard from a neighbor that it was a murder-suicide.

"How sad. Just like the one ... recently," he said, referring to the murder-suicide of an Ewa Beach couple that left four children orphaned. Della Dikito was shot to death in her Ewa Beach home last month by her husband, Domingo "Bunny" Dikito, who then killed himself.