Hawai'i fugitive nabbed in Maine
By Walter Wright
Advertiser Staff Writer
James Earsel Duquette's running days appear to be over. For now.
Duquette, who murdered a Waikiki prostitute in 1977, and robbed and stabbed a Maui tourist in 1980, has escaped here so often he is known in prison parlance as a rabbit.
James Earsel Duquette was arrested Friday in Portland, Maine, for trespassing.
Yesterday in Portland, Maine, he was the catch of the day.
Cumberland County Deputy Sheriff Patrick McKinney said the very intoxicated man arrested Friday for trespassing gave his name as John Sutton and — after he had sobered up a little — said it was James Sauter.
McKinney sent the man's fingerprints to the FBI and found he was Hawai'i escapee James Duquette, 53.
It was Duquette's second sojourn in Maine.
In 1992 — after escaping from custody on Maui — Duquette was arrested in Gray, Maine, after attempting suicide.
In October, he didn't come home to the Laumaka Work Furlough Facility, and a warrant was issued for his arrest.
Duquette's Hawai'i troubles began just a few weeks after he arrived in 1977, at the age of 27, after police found the body of 25-year-old Renee McDaniels in his Kina'u Street apartment. The woman, also known as Lora London, Loralei London and Jamie Williams, had been strangled.
Advertiser library photo • April 24, 1977
At the trial in 1978, prosecutors said Duquette met McDaniels in a Waikiki discotheque. After they went to his apartment, Duquette said "something snapped," and he remembered putting his hands to her throat and hearing her scream.
James Earsel Duquette's troubles began just a few weeks after arriving in Hawai'i in 1977. Here he's being led away by a police officer after his arrest that year in the death of a Waikiki prostitute.
His lawyer said he was so drunk at the time he should get off with manslaughter. The jury convicted him of murder. He was sentenced to 20 years, but the parole board set his minimum term at eight years.
By 1980, prison authorities had decided Duquette's murder of McDaniels was, a spokesman said at the time, "a one-time thing," and that "his record in prison was good enough to allow him to go out on work assignments under supervision."
But when a prison foreman and Duquette stopped at Jet Burger Drive In for lunch, Duquette walked away.
Five weeks later, Duquette was in the Hukilau Hotel on Maui, stabbing tourist Danny Mayberry after robbing Mayberry and his parents.
He was convicted of escape as well as robbery, assault and kidnapping.
He got life for the robbery, and two 20-year terms for the rest. His minimum term was set at 12 years.
In October 1980 Duquette cut his bars with a hacksaw, but was captured in the O'ahu prison yard.
In 1984, Duquette helped decorate his cellblock for Christmas, and got some publicity. "We are supposed to be hard core," Duquette told a newspaper reporter. "It's just that somewhere along the line we took the wrong road ... But people do change."
In August, 1991, Duquette was put on work furlough again.
He walked away in September.
A year later, Duquette checked into the Jones Beach Motel in Gray, Maine, and slashed his wrists with a razor.
Taken by state police to the Maine Medical Center, he was identified as the escaped murderer from Maui, and brought back.
By 1996, Duquette had escaped again, but was captured on the Mainland and returned to Hawai'i.
Yesterday, Cumberland Sheriff Mark Dion said Duquette probably would still be free had Deputy McKinney not faxed the prints to the FBI for an immediate check.
"He could have made bail," Dion told the Portland Press Herald, "and hit the road."
Reach Walter Wright at wwright@honoluluadvertiser.com or 525-8054.
