A SIX-year-old girl was “found dead in a dog cage with tape covering her mouth and nose,” her sister has claimed. The shocking claims were revealed in a criminal complaint filed Friday in the Honolulu circuit court. Isabella Kalua’s sister, who was only identified by her initials, provided details to a Honolulu police detective on […]
A SIX-year-old girl was “found dead in a dog cage with tape covering her mouth and nose,” her sister has claimed.
The shocking claims were revealed in a criminal complaint filed Friday in the Honolulu circuit court.
Isabella Kalua’s sister, who was only identified by her initials, provided details to a Honolulu police detective on November 5, almost two months after Isabella was reported missing by her parents Isaac Kalua, 52, and Lehua Kalua, 43.
The couple were arrested on suspicion of second-degree murder Wednesday.
Isaac Kalua denied being involved in Isabella’s disappearance in an interview with police, according to the complaint.
Both Isabella and her sister had been adopted by the Kaluas.
The events the sister described are said to have taken place about two months before she spoke to the cops, according to the documents.
She claimed she had seen Isabella duct-taped and inside the cage in the middle of the night.
Isabella wasn’t breathing at the time, she told the detective.
Lehua Kalua is then said to have taken Isabella out of the cage and put her in a tub filled with water “to see if she would wake up,” the sister said but “it did not work”.
Her parents are then said to have told her to “keep a secret” that Isabella did not wake up, according to the documents.
The sister then told the detective her sister was did but added she did not know what her parents had done with her body.
Isabella’s body has still not been located.
The sister said Isabella was put in the cage because she would “sneak around at night and want to eat because she was hungry”.
She also said that Lehua Kalua had duct-taped Isabella “plenty of times” in the past.
The sister claimed Lehua Kalua had refused to feed six-year-old Isabella.
The case has been referred to the Honolulu public defender’s office, which has not yet commented.
Lawyer and family friend William Harrison, who has previously spoken on the couple’s behalf, said in an email Friday he had just learned about the allegations and was not representing them.
Lehua Kalua told the authorities the last time she had seen Isabella was on the night of September 12, when they ate dinner together, according to the complaint.
When she found Isabella’s bed empty the next morning, cops were sent to the Kalua’s home to take a report she was missing.
A massive hunt involving hundreds of volunteers then took place which scoured the Waimanalo area of Honolulu in a desperate bid to find the young girl.
“I’m extremely heartbroken. My family’s extremely heartbroken,” said Alena Kaeo, Isabella’s biological aunt. “We’re hurting as a family to think that our niece has been going through something like this as well as the rest of our nieces and for the older sibling to have to have taken a role in the acts of Isaac and Lehua. It’s very sad.”
“We’re feeling extremely angry,” Kaeo said. “But I definitely feel like I’ve been slapped across my face with fakeness with fake remorse — them showing us that they loved our nieces but that was all just an act.”
Isaac and Lehua Kalua appeared in court for the first time Friday via a livestream from Oahu Community Correctional Center, and allowed their attorney to submit not guilty pleas of their behalf.
They are due to appear in court next on November 26.
The children’s biological parents are said to be homeless in the Waimanalo area, according to the complaint.
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