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COURTESY HAWAII POLICE DEPARTMENT
Joseph Diego Soares
Hawaii island police have charged a 35-year-old Mountain View man with an array of firearm and drug offenses following an hours-long armed standoff in the Aloha Estates subdivision in Puna on Thursday, police said today.
Bail was set at $269,000, police said, as Joseph Diego Soares remains in custody at the Hawaii Community Correctional Center. He is scheduled to appear in Hilo District Court on Monday.
The charges against Soares stem from an incident on Thursday shortly after 1:30 p.m., when officers conducting a warrant sweep in the Kopua Farm Lots area of the Puna district saw a vehicle being driven by Soares, who was wanted with two outstanding warrants.
When Soares saw the officers, he drove away. But then he was experiencing car trouble, police said, and he reached his arm out of the vehicle and fired a pistol. He then got out of his car and, placing the pistol to his head, he ran up Mauna Loa Road with officers in pursuit for over a mile.
Following a standoff in the Aloha Estates subdivision, Soares was finally taken into custody at 6 p.m.
Police are asking anyone with information about this case to call the police department’s non-emergency line at (808) 935-3311 or Det. Paul Mangus at (808) 961-2383 or paul.mangus@hawaiicounty.gov.
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