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‘Violent psychopath’ sought after escaping Hawaii hospital, boarding flight

Posted at 8:54 PM, Nov 14, 2017
and last updated 2017-11-14 20:54:15-05

HONOLULU – Investigators are searching for a man officials have described as a “violent psychopath” after he escaped from a Hawaii hospital Sunday, according to KHNL.

Maui police announced Tuesday that 59-year-old Randall Toshio Saito managed to escape Oahu’s Hawaii State Hospital and catch a flight to Maui. Multiple sources told KHNL that Saito managed to get on a Hawaiian Airlines flight to San Jose, California, landing around 7:30 p.m. that Sunday.

Where he is now is not clear, but authorities say he has family in California. Police are warning people not to approach Saito if they see him.

It’s not yet clear how Saito managed to walk away from the state-run facility.

In 1981, authorities committed Saito to the hospital following the gruesome murder of 29-year-old Sandra Yamashiro, who prosecutors said Saito shot and stabbed numerous times before leaving her body at Ala Moana Center in Honolulu.

Saito was acquitted of the murder by reason of insanity.

He filed for a conditional release in 1993 but was denied after the court said he still had an attraction to necrophilia and suffered from sadistic, sexual urges that made him a danger to the community.

“Randall Saito is a very disturbed, mentally ill individual,” said deputy prosecutor Jeff Albert at the time, according to KHON. “He’s a very dangerous individual with respect to whom all the predictors indicate that if he were to be released, he would kill again.”

His attorneys’ request for release was denied again in 2000, at which time Albert said Saito “fills all the criteria of a classic serial killer.”

Anyone with information about Saito is asked to call police at (808) 244-6400 or call 911 in an emergency. You may also call the Hawaii State Department of Public Safety Sheriff’s Department at (808) 587-3623.