It has been revealed that a gun used in the recent hold up of the Orator Hotel was police issued.
The Weekend Observer had reported that two weeks ago, staff feared for their lives when three escaped prisoners from Tafaigata broke into the hotel and fired a gunshot.
A source, speaking to the Samoa Observer on the condition of anonymity, said the police told them that the gun used in the attack was police issued – and that police knew this because of the bullets in the gun.
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“They said there was only five bullets in the gun, and that there should have been six in the chamber,” they said. The source said police were unsure of just how the offenders got hold of the gun in the first place.
However, he said police did say that the perpetrators had escaped the prison and were drinking at a house close to the Orator.
It was then that they came onto the property – not via the road but via a back way.
Pataua Talimale, who is a groundsman at the hotel, told the Samoa Observer the prisoners stole luggage and broke into two villas and took cash and a handbag. “They (prisoners) took it,” said Mr. Talimale. “I think it was all planned out because it wasn’t just one person that was involved in the break in,” he said. “One came running from inside the garden while another was waiting for him at the front.”
The grounds man said the police were contacted and they are investigating.
“We were told that the prisoners have been found.” According to a Police agenda paper titled Executive and Senior Management Meeting on 1st December 2014, obtained by the Weekend Observer, three prisoners were involved in the break in.
“It seems that these prisoners were taken to do chores outside of prison,” the paper reads.
“Just an advice not to release prisoners to do outside work. The Orator hotel was broken into on the night they escaped.”
Asked for a comment, Assistant Police Commissioner Fauono Talalelei Tapu said he did not have full details involving the prisoners. When the Commissioner of Tafaigata prison Taitosaua Edward Winterstein was contacted for a comment, his secretary said the matter was being investigated by the police.
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