Posted on: Sunday, May 1, 2005
Wai'anae shaken by sexual assault
By Dan Nakaso
Advertiser Staff Writer
WAI'ANAE — Parents in the Kau'iokalani public housing complex held their children a little tighter yesterday and some even made them stay inside on a gorgeous Saturday afternoon.
Tears formed in Noe Holokahi's eyes as she thought of her own 8-year-old daughter yesterday — the youngest of her five children.
"She's my baby girl," Holokahi said. "I'm kind of shaken up and worried."
Like other parents, Holokahi told her younger children to stay inside and play video games instead of running around Kau'iokalani.
Bruce Asato • The Honolulu Advertiser Honolulu police hope someone can help identify the man who lured the 8-year-old girl from the Wai'anae Neighborhood Community Center Thursday night, took her to a nearby vacant lot and sexually assaulted her.
The girl was found by family members who had begun searching when she went missing.
The assailant is described as having a heavy build. The child told police he was wearing a red hat, gray shirt, black shorts and white shoes. Anyone with information is asked to call Crime-Stoppers at 955-8300.
Some residents of Kau'iokalani visibly flinched at the composite sketch.
They said they've seen the man around Kau'iokalani.
The Wai'anae Neighborhood Community Center sits just makai of Kau'iokalani, where resident and Neighborhood Watch organizer Pearl Bautista had been struggling to muster seven regular volunteers to keep an eye on the housing complex.
As word spread of the attack, Bautista organized a Neighborhood Watch meeting Friday — the night after the assault.
She suddenly had 17 volunteers and lots of parents willing to keep an eye on each other's children.
For a while at least, parents vowed to shutter their children inside after dark. Bautista, armed with new troops, deployed "my boys" around the perimeter of Kau'iokalani.
"We've really beefed up security," she said. "We have a whole lot more help since that happened."
Extra precautions
Cassandra Keawe, the mother of five children ages 3 to 13, added a lock to her screen door after Thursday's attack and wedged sticks into her home's windows.
"This is scary," she said.
Like other frightened parents, Keawe turned out for the Neighborhood Watch meeting. And she was happy to channel her anxiety into better security.
Keawe pointed out various spots in the complex that are in clear line of sight to the Wai'anae Neighborhood Community Center.
"We stood post here and we stood post there," Keawe said.
She swept her eyes across the center of the housing complex that normally would be spilling over with children.
"On the weekend, especially," Keawe said, "everyone's always out playing. Not today. Everybody's inside. We are definitely watching our kids more closely."
Marlee Patcho, 15, Phoebe Morimoto, 12, and Chelsea Vallo, 11, all got the message.
"We have to be in the house before nighttime," Phoebe said. "You know, ever since what happened."
Reach Dan Nakaso at dnakaso@honoluluadvertiser.com or 525-8085.
Outside, Honolulu police distributed a sketch of a stranger suspected of kidnapping an 8-year-old girl just steps from Kau'iokalani and sexually assaulting her Thursday.
Suspect
"I'm telling them, 'Be aware — and stay in the house,' " she said.
Like many parents in the area, Noe Holokahi was keeping her kids, including 11-year-old son, Joseph, right, inside where she could keep better tabs on him following an assault on a young girl near their Wai'anae neighborhood. She was also keeping an eye on Joseph's neighborhood friend, Leland Arcangel, center.
