Volcano residents voice crime concerns: Police attend meeting to address spike in burglaries, other offenses

VOLCANO — About 45 Volcano residents met Wednesday at Cooper Center with Puna police commanders and community policing officers to express concern about a spike in crime, especially burglaries.

The meeting’s organizer, Lisa — who requested her last name not be printed — said burglars have hit a number of her neighbors’ homes, and she fears she will be next.

“My house is basically empty because I’m waiting for (burglars) to hit, OK? We put everything in a storage unit,” Lisa said. “All my jewelry is in a safe-deposit box because we have some very special things we don’t want lost.

“… Now, since mid-January, I’ve been talking to the police on a regular basis. They have come at least 13 times to my street and hassled these guys. They pulled out a stolen vehicle. They pulled out a stolen trailer. They’ve done other things. They’re not sitting on their wallets. There are not enough policemen. They’re spread too thin.”

Community Policing Officer Jeremy Kubojiri, who serves the Volcano area, gave a PowerPoint presentation reflecting a statistical uptick in property crimes in Volcano and the Puna District.

There have been 15 reported burglaries, which are break-ins at homes and businesses, in the Volcano area in the first four months of 2017, including eight in April — five more than the prior month. That compares to nine burglaries in Volcano for all of 2016.

For the entire Puna District, there were 29 reported burglaries in March and 30 in April, as opposed to 11 each in March and April 2016.

“We do realize that crime has been on a spike in this area, along with the rest of the district,” said Kubojiri, who noted that at any given time, there are eight patrol officers on watch in all of Puna, although Community Policing officers do some patrolling, as well.

There were 27 reported thefts in Volcano in the first four months compared to 16 for all of last year.

Robbery, the taking of property by the use of force or threat of force on a person or persons — which makes it a property offense and violent crime — is normally low in Hawaii County. There were no robberies reported in January or February, but five in March and three in April.

Capt. Samuel Jelsma, the police commander in Puna, said the March robbery number was “driven by that serial hitchhiker.” He was referring to Mason Beck, who’s charged with three counts of robbery for armed carjackings.

“Traditionally, we see no robberies or possibly one robbery per month,” Jelsma said. “We arrested him pretty quickly and put an end to that.”

Car break-ins, which spiked last summer to 17 in June and 16 each in July, August and September, are once again on the rise in the Puna District. Four were reported in January and February, with 11 in March and 13 in April.

There’s also a recent rash of auto thefts in Puna. Fifteen were reported in January. February and March took a downturn with seven and six reports, respectively, followed by a spike to 22.

There were complaints about drug houses and thieves cruising subdivisions casing homes. One woman told the Tribune-Herald afterward that vicious dogs allowed to run loose by neighbors terrorized her and her family on their own property, and police and the Humane Society failed to act.

A retired couple who own a vacation rental say it’s been burglarized three times in three years. The husband called it “emotionally as well as financially devastating.”

“This was the investment so we could have income for our retirement,” the man said. “So, that property is now basically useless to us. We don’t feel comfortable renting it out to people who are visiting because we can’t in good faith say to them, ‘Come stay at this wonderful place,’ when we know that on Christmas Eve … our guests were ripped off for thousands of dollars worth of equipment.”

A man who identified himself as Hank Banker referred to “kid-glove treatment of these criminals” and said he installed a video system at his farm that notifies his cellphone.

“I had a $20,000 custom equipment trailer stolen. To replace that … is over $40,000, including shipping,” Banker said. “… We need to get rid of these guys who do this. You lock ’em up and they’re back on the street in no time. They get bailed out.”

“Sir, I understand you’re frustrated,” Jelsma replied. “But our job as policemen is to apprehend these people, and we’re doing the best that we can. I don’t know if you’ve seen the media release that I issued the other day, a vehicle was stolen in Volcano the night before. We went to the house to go pick the guy up. He rammed two of our police vehicles and took off with the stolen vehicle. So we’re making an effort on our end.”

Jelsma added that because of prison overcrowding, the parole board chooses to lock up violent criminals longer than thieves.

Ron Costa, coordinator for Fern Forest Neighborhood Watch, told those assembled “a good, strong neighborhood watch” is essential for neighborhood security.

“My suggestion is to do it as a subdivision,” he said. “Each subdivision should have their own neighborhood watch. Don’t have a big (area) because (the coordinator) will get overwhelmed.”

“We want to support our Police Department,” Lisa concluded. “We’re going to be talking to the mayor, the (county) Council and state Legislature to ask them to find money to support the Police Department. And to do that, we’re going to need everybody’s help. So everybody in this room has an important role to play.”

Email John Burnett at jburnett@hawaiitribune-herald.com.