Reward offered for missing Kapahulu woman
By Walter Wright
Advertiser Staff Writer
The parents of missing Tracey Mieko Tominaga, a 37-year-old Kapahulu woman last seen Jan. 20, yesterday offered a $2,500 reward for information leading to the return of their daughter.
"It's not a very large amount," retired nurse Betty Tominaga said yesterday, "but looking at things, it was probably all we could afford right now."
Hotel worker Tracey Tominaga was last seen Jan. 20.
A private detective told the Tominagas he would charge them $100 an hour to try to find their daughter and recommended they rely on the active police investigation instead, Betty Tominaga said.
"We wouldn't have been able to afford that for very long," she said.
Officer Joe Self of the Honolulu Police Department's Missing Persons Detail said yesterday that police have no new leads in the case, and will not speculate about what happened, but hope the publicity about the reward may help.
"We're hoping for a miracle," said Betty Tominaga, who said her Bible study group and her church have helped her cope.
"We hope one day she's going to come in and say, 'Hello, I am here,'" said retired plumber Donald Tominaga, 64, the missing woman's father. "But two months is kind of too long. We don't have any theories, we just up in the air about what really happened."
Church members have helped the family distribute leaflets around Honolulu, and one is sending e-mail messages seeking help.
"The thing is hard, the first part was kind of hard, hard to sleep thinking about this," Donald Tominaga said. "But as time went by the support from our church sustained us, and that's what's keeping us from going over the deep end."
Tracey Tominaga, a hotel worker at Hilton Hawaiian Village, was last seen at 8:30 a.m. Sunday, Jan. 20, by a friend, Self said. Later that morning, she received a telephone call from a friend at home about 10 a.m., but wasn't there when the friend arrived two hours later.
Another friend found a plate of half-eaten food in her room when she came looking for her four days later, and found the woman's locked car parked in front of the house. The friend called police, who made the disappearance a missing persons case 24 hours later.
Tracey Tominaga, a Pearl City High School graduate, is 5 feet 3, 120 pounds, slim, with a fair complexion and brown eyes and brown shoulder-length hair.
Police do not know what clothes she was wearing when she left the house.
Anyone who may have seen her or who has information is asked to call Self at 529-3064 or 529-3115. Calls can also be made to 911 or to the CrimeStoppers anonymous hot line at 955-8300.
Reach Walter Wright at 525-8054 or wwright@honoluluadvertiser.com.
