Big Island man hurt in robbery overseas
Advertiser Staff
HILO, Hawai'i — A Big Island man was wounded and held hostage for 30 hours in a bloody, botched bank robbery last week in the Costa Rican tourist town of Santa Elena de Monteverde.
Nine people were killed and 16 others injured during gunbattles at the town's only bank, Banco Nacional. David Saunders, a 2000 graduate of Hilo High School, was among the most seriously wounded, according to a family friend and news accounts.
Saunders
Dr. Steve Morrison of Hilo, who knows the Saunders family, said the young man and his girlfriend stopped into the bank March 8 to make a transaction. Both were injured when a gang of robbers entered the bank firing AK-47s and other weapons. Two of the robbers were killed by guards at the start of the shooting, and a third died when police stormed the bank the next day. The surviving gunman surrendered. Five bank customers and a policeman were killed along with the robbers.
Saunders' parents, Hilo residents Bob and Meg Saunders, traveled to Costa Rica to see to their son, Morrison said.
Santa Elena de Monteverde is about 60 miles north of Costa Rica's capital city of San Jose.
