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Man, 81, accused of using wooden stool to bludgeon his ex-wife at Ala Moana apartment

Leila Fujimori
HPD
                                Rogelio Canilao
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HPD

Rogelio Canilao

An Oahu grand jury Wednesday indicted an 81-year-old Oxnard, Calif., man on a charge of second-­degree murder in the bludgeoning death of his 76-year-old ex-wife.

Rogelio Canilao allegedly beat Teresita Canilao to death, repeatedly striking her in the face with a wooden stool.

His ex-wife, Teresita “Tessie” Canilao, a longtime secretary at the Philippine Consulate of Honolulu, had been recovering over the past year from Parkinson’s disease, Deputy Prosecutor Benjamin Rose said after the grand jury returned with an indictment in the case.

Rose told the judge that Rogelio Canilao flew to Hawaii and stayed with her from Sept. 28 to Oct. 4 at her Ala Moana apartment to take care of her.

But they had a disagreement on Oct. 6 and he “continually bashed her face with a wooden stool,” Rose said, adding she died of multiple blunt-force injuries, injuries to her sternum, splinters in her face, hands and hair and noted that there were “no defensive wounds.”

The couple moved to Hawaii from the Philippines in the 1980s.

Teresita Canilao had moved to Honolulu as a member of the foreign service, and the couple got a divorce in the 1980s, Rose said. He moved to California, where he has lived mostly, and also has lived in Alaska.

Court records in Hawaii show she filed for divorce in 1981, but it is unclear whether the divorce was ever finalized since no divorce decree was filed, according to the court’s online database.

Rose said they had been divorced since the 1980s, but had begun to reconcile over the past year.

He asked that Canilao be held without bail as he is a flight risk and that, if released, might flee to California or the Philippines.

Circuit Judge Christine Kuriyama ordered he be held without bail. She also ordered a bench warrant to issue for his arrest, although he was already in custody and being held in lieu of $1 million bail.

The judge also ordered Canilao not to contact two of their children.

When police arrived at Teresita Canilao’s Sheridan Street apartment, Rogelio Canilao reportedly told police he murdered his wife.

Rose said Canilao placed his hands behind his neck and then behind his back, as if submitting to be handcuffed, without prompting from police.

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