Police arrested the 26-year-old O'ahu Community Correctional Center inmate on Thursday on suspicion of second-degree robbery and kidnapping. The inmate was at OCCC for a prior offense.

Also on Thursday, police arrested a 26-year-old 'Ewa Beach man on suspicion of second-degree robbery and kidnapping.

On Jan. 30, police said, a robber entered the laundry at 95-1249 Meheula Parkway and walked behind the service counter. The 27-year-old woman employee told the man the area was restricted to employees. The robber told her he had a gun as a second robber entered and grabbed her.

The woman managed to break free and ran out the door screaming. Both robbers fled in a white four-door Honda Civic.

State hospital inmate arrested

A 34-year-old man who left the Hawai'i State Hospital without permission yesterday was arrested by police yesterday. It was the second time he had left the facility without authorization since December.

Milton Ashley Place walked away from the Kaneohe facility yesterday afternoon and returned several hours later, police said. The hospital staff called police and Place was arrested on suspicion of second-degree escape.

In December police arrested him at Ala Moana Park after he failed to return after an unescorted excursion on hospital grounds. Police said Place had gone swimming.

Man suspected in kidnapping

Police are investigating a case involving a man who is suspected of luring a 29-year-old woman to his car, knocking her out and kidnapping her from the Honolulu Airport area yesterday afternoon.

Police said the woman was making a flower delivery across the street from her workplace at about 12:45 p.m. yesterday when a man in a car stopped her and asked for directions.

As she leaned into the car to look at a map, the man pulled her in, police said. The woman was released near the Kapi'olani Bandstand, where she called police. She received minor injuries, police said.

Woman injured in single-car crash

An 85-year-old woman was hospitalized today after her Honda Civic sideswiped a tractor trailer, veered across three lanes of oncoming traffic on Ward Avenue, jumped a curb, severed a parking meter and smashed into the side of the Hawaiian South Shore surf shop.

The accident happened about 9:35 a.m., police said. The woman, driving mauka on Ward Avenue, told police her accelerator jammed. She was taken to Straub Clinic & Hospital for treatment of minor injuries, police said.