Man Arrested for Murder in Hilo

[knieft]

HotPE: "They arrived after we did, didn't they?"

Priceless...!

Cheers,
Kirt

[opihikao]

May this woman rest in peace. How sad, heart wrenching, and painful for her ohana. So saddened by this tragedy. [V]

FYI: (*Snipped - More at link)

http://hawaiitribune-herald.com/news/loc...ated-woman


The daughter of a 49-year-old woman stabbed to death last week in downtown Hilo said her mother was “an educated woman,” and media descriptions of her as a homeless person do her life and memory a disservice.

Chloe Caron said her mother, Danielle Caron, originally was from Pacific Palisades, an affluent Los Angeles neighborhood, but spent almost two decades in Santa Cruz., Calif., before moving to the Big Island a couple of years ago.

“She graduated from college with a master’s (degree) in teaching,” Chloe Caron said. “She’s talented. She’s artistic; she can draw. She has a genius IQ. She’s a loving woman with an addiction problem. She moved to the Big Island. I lived on Kauai for five years. I moved her out there myself to give her a new opportunity to change for the better. When I moved her out to Hawaii, I was with her for about a month, so I know that she was sober. For a while, she was working on an organic farm and she was trying to pretty much survive.”

Chloe Caron said she last talked to her mother about a month ago.

“She said she was going back to school, and she was medically healthy, and mentally, she had overcome a lot,” the 23-year-old woman said in a Tuesday phone call from the San Francisco Bay Area.

She said her mother, whose body was found early Friday morning in front of the Koehnen Building on Kamehameha Avenue, fell victim to “one of those ‘wrong place, wrong time’ kind of things.”

“When I read the news, it breaks my heart to read ‘homeless woman murdered.’ That’s not who she was,” Chloe Caron said. “She had a lot to give people. She was kind. She wasn’t a homeless addict who robbed people or anything like that.”

Until recently, Danielle Caron had an address in Pahoa, records indicate.

“She was originally living in Pahoa when she first moved to Hawaii,” Chloe Caron said. “I’m not really too sure where she was recently. I know she had a boyfriend. His name was Brian (Trantham). She was staying with her boyfriend, and she was trying to go to Florida … because he had family there that was sick, and they were going to go there and take care of them. I don’t know if he knows (about the homicide), or where he is, anything like that.”



Apparently, Trantham did go to Florida. A Tuesday post on his Facebook page read, “How is it someone you care for is murdered 7,000 miles away, calls your name, and awakens you from a deep sleep, at the time of death?”

Curtis Hodges, a 35-year-old man from Shiloh, Ill., was arrested Friday at the Hilo Bay Hostel and charged with Danielle Caron’s murder. Surveillance video of the area led to his arrest, police said.

Hodges is incarcerated without bail awaiting a mental examination.

“It’s just callous. There’s no words; there’s no justification,” Chloe Caron said. “I will be going to the murder trial. I will be looking at that guy in the eye, and I will make sure that he’s locked up for life. If it’s the hardest thing I ever have to do, I will fight for her, and I will make sure this doesn’t go unnoticed or swept under the rug.”

Danielle Caron also leaves behind another daughter, Amber, and a grandson, Gavin.

“It breaks my heart,” Chloe Caron said. “The last thing I know, she was trying to pull her life back together and get herself a job and back into school and do whatever she can.

“She was more than a homeless woman. She was a beautiful, intelligent, educated, artistic, loving person. Everybody has problems. No one deserves that. I hope people can sympathize and support me and my family through this.”

[leilanidude]

"... woman with an addiction problem. She moved to the Big Island..."
-----------------

Yes, agree, absolutely terrible thing to have happened to her. No one deserves that.

Every week, it seems that another 10+ addicts show up in Pahoa. It is the LAST place an addict should be allowed to come to. Way too many drugs (including marijuana) that are cheap and easy to get. It only feeds their addictions.

[MattKarma]

I saw a police car and two officers hanging out near the Hostel thursday night. Perhaps they spooked him?

[Bullwinkle]

This was murder after a rape - this was a a hate crime by definition - nothing mental or drug related about it, should be prosecuted as one.

Guy sliced the poor womans carotid artery. A skillful execution to keep her from talking. may she rest in peace

[justthefacts]

pahoa seems to be the meca for some mainlanders . so many come here from the mainland looking for the drug lifestyle and end up being a burden to the residents in the area and the tax payers . it is sad how this womens life ended . i agree not mental illness a sexual predator .
she is not the first person that came looking for the "high" life remember the young man that overdosed at a rave party not to long ago in hawaiian acres. another sad ending to a visitor.