Police pressure flushed escapees to their captors

By Curtis Lum
Advertiser Staff Writer

Three Halawa prison escapees who evaded police for nearly a week had planned on hiding in the hills above Hau'ula for six months until the manhunt died down and they could quietly walk out of the valley.

David Scribner, 20, was arrested as he walked along the highway in Punalu'u. Bruce Asato • The Honolulu Advertiser

"You can run, but you can't hide," said an elated Jim Propotnick, interim director of the Department of Public Safety which runs state prisons. "We proved that today."

The arrests of the three fugitives, whom police described as possibly armed and dangerous, ended a massive law enforcement manhunt focusing on the Windward valley since their escape from the high-security facility at Halawa prison last Friday.

Police said they came so close on several occasions that the escapees recognized their voices.

David Scribner was arrested as he walked along Kamehameha Highway near Pat's at Punalu'u at 12:05 p.m.

Albert Batalona was ordered off a city bus in Kane'ohe 10 minutes later.

At 12:29, police arrested Warren Elicker, who was riding in a pickup truck near Castle High School.

None was armed when caught.

The driver of the truck, a 25-year-old North Shore man, was arrested on suspicion of hindering prosecution.

The convicts were booked on an escape charge carrying a prison term of up to five years. All three were returned to Halawa prison late yesterday.

Warren Elicker, 25, was arrested after an officer spotted him riding in a pickup near Castle High School yesterday. Eugene Tanner • The Honolulu Advertiser

"We did have forces that put a lot of pressure in the valley ... night and day," said Honolulu Police Assistant Chief Boisse Correa. "So that pressure, we feel, gave them their impetus to come back out of the valley. We surrounded the outside with a lot of officers and it paid off."

Batalona, 27, Elicker, 25, and Scribner, 20, broke out of the Halawa facility's maximum-security unit. Elicker and Scribner apparently removed a plumbing access panel from one cell wall, then broke through the concrete wall on Batalona's side to gain access to a space between the two cells that allowed them to descend to a basement.

Once free, they allegedly carjacked a Honda Civic at the Stadium Mall and drove to the Hau'ula Kai Shopping Center where they ditched the vehicle. They immediately headed for the hills, said police Lt. Bill Kato, who led the search.

"They mentioned that they were gonna try to live in there for six months. And hopefully the publicity and all the heat would blow over and at that point they were going to come out," Kato said.

But their plans began to fall apart when they were spotted Sunday by a pig hunter near the foot of the Hau'ula Loop Trail. Kato said the escapees were forced to move deeper in the valley and be on the move daily.

At one point, the fugitives reached the Ko'olau summit, but Kato said they were surrounded by steep cliffs and tough terrain and decided to make their way back into the valley. Police discovered a campsite where they believed the trio had stayed, so the search focused on that general area.

Albert Batalona, 27, is escorted into the Honolulu Police Department after being caught in Kane'ohe. Richard Ambo • The Honolulu Advertiser

During their run, the three apparently made their way to an abandoned shack, where they found clothing. They said they lived on fruit, water and beef jerky.

Sometime yesterday morning, the men decided to leave the valley. They somehow avoided the dozens of officers in the area, but a woman told police that she heard people talking near her home and realized they were the escapees. Correa said officers were alerted that the trio may have come out of the valley.

The next break came when someone resembling Batalona was spotted on a city bus in Punalu'u. A plainclothes police officer got on the bus, but because the man was wearing a ski hat and dark glasses and Batalona's appearance had changed so much since he entered prison, the officer wasn't sure it was him, Correa said.

But at about 12:05, Officer Rik Orton was on patrol when he spotted a man believed to be Scribner walking south on Kamehameha Highway. Orton said he drove past the man, turned into Pat's at Punalu'u, radioed for assistance, and returned to the man.

Orton said he ordered Scribner to the ground, but at first he refused.

"He was telling me that he didn't want to go back to prison. He said, 'Shoot me now. I'm not going back to prison,' " Orton said.

After repeated commands by Orton, Scribner gave up. Orton said he was hoping there would not be a confrontation but said he was prepared to fire his gun.

Orton said he also was concerned that the two other escapees were in the vicinity. "Because he didn't try to run from me, my thought was that maybe two of them might come from behind me and try to jump me. So I was aware of my surroundings," he said.

Once Scribner was arrested, police were sure the man on the bus was Batalona. By then, the bus had reached downtown Kane'ohe and officers surrounded the bus near the American Savings Bank. Batalona came out with his hands up.

"Once we had somebody on the bus that could make a tactical decision and give us certain type of information, then we knew that we were in a pretty good position to stop the bus and do what we had to do and protect everybody on the bus," Correa said.

At about the same time, police received a tip that Elicker was riding in a white pickup in Kane'ohe. Police converged on the truck near Castle High on Kane'ohe Bay Drive and ordered Elicker and the driver out.

The final arrest came within 30 minutes of Scribner's apprehension and ended six days of the intense search by police, the state sheriff's office, attorney general's office, Department of Land and Natural Resources, and federal agencies. Correa said nearly 200 officers were involved in the manhunt.

Kato said he didn't know if the men wanted to be caught. "There was no resistance, and Scribner seemed kind of relieved," he said.

Batalona's arrest attracted a group of lunchtime customers of fast-food restaurants who took their sandwiches outside to watch the action, said witness Young Chu. "(The police) dragged the guy from the bus and handcuffed him," he said, estimating that 10 officers were there, including three who had been at a construction site nearby.

One witness to Elicker's arrest was Roberto Paulo, 29, who had served on the jury that convicted Batalona of armed robbery of the American Savings Bank's Kahala Branch in 1999 and firing a rifle at a police officer. Paulo said he feared that Batalona was the passenger in the truck and would try to retaliate against the jurors. "I hope they have another place for him to stay this time," Paulo said.

Batalona was serving a life term without parole for the armed bank robbery and attempted murder of the officer.

Elicker was serving a 40-year sentence for a 2001 home-invasion robbery of a Punalu'u couple.

Scribner has seven felony convictions. He was serving a 10-year sentence for October 2002 robbery and escape convictions.

Staff writers Mike Gordon, Walter Wright and Eloise Aguiar contributed to this report.