Hui Jae Cho says he was trying to save his wife’s life when he stabbed her attacker multiple times during a robbery at their Palolo convenience store this month.
"I love my wife," the 65-year-old Cho said Sunday.
Cho and his wife, Eun Jung, 60, returned to work for the first time this weekend even though they are still nursing injuries from their March 20 ordeal.
Cho wore a cast on his left forearm, with bandages on his forehead covering two gashes that required 40 stitches. His wife had a bandage on her nose.
Police said that at about 7:35 a.m. March 20, two males entered the store, Valley Market on 10th Avenue, and assaulted a man and a woman working at the store before stealing property and fleeing in a light-colored SUV.
Police released security-video footage of the robbers the day of the attack and asked for the public’s help in identifying the suspects.
That evening a 17-year-old boy was arrested in connection with the robbery, and less than a week later a 36-year-old man was detained.
Reef Keliipuleole-Gasmen, 36, was charged Thursday with first-degree robbery, second-degree assault and third-degree promotion of a dangerous drug. First-degree robbery is punishable by up to 20 years in prison.
He is being held at Oahu Community Correctional Center, unable to post $250,000 bail. He has a preliminary hearing Thursday.
His alleged accomplice, the teen, had a petition filed against him, which is similar to an adult being charged with a crime.
Hui Jae Cho said the incident began while he was at a kitchen sink in the back of the store. He heard his wife scream from the front of the store, and when he tried to walk forward to see what was happening, a man sprang from behind a corner and struck him on the head with a metal pipe about 2 inches thick and a couple of feet long.
Cho said he stumbled backward, and the assailant continued thrashing him with the pipe. Cho, who was in South Korea’s marine corps as a youth and has practiced martial arts, suffered a fractured bone in his forearm when he raised his left arm to deflect some of the blows.
The 5-foot-6-inch Cho grabbed a knife with a 5-inch blade from the sink and began swinging it at his assailant, who was described in court documents as being 6 feet 2 inches tall and weighing 205 pounds.
As the man backed away, Cho could see his wife getting punched and choked by a second large assailant, later identified as the juvenile.
Cho said the amount of blood gushing from his head caused him to think he wasn’t going to survive, so he wanted to use the last of his energy to save his wife.
With the man still trying to hit him with the pipe, Cho went behind the counter and tried to pull the attacker off his wife. When the attacker wouldn’t let her go, Cho stabbed him multiple times in the shoulder. The attacker’s arm went limp and the two men fled.
Cho’s wife said she couldn’t recall much of the attack, but a police affidavit said she reported she became suspicious after noticing two male individuals enter with their heads covered.
The teen went behind the counter and pushed her in the chest. She pushed him back, and the attacker began punching her multiple times in the head, the affidavit said.
She fought back with a butane can. During the struggle, the suspect was pulling cables out of a video system, the affidavit said.
Cho said his daughter, a nurse on Oahu, and his son, who lives in California, kept the store open while he and his wife recovered because he was worried about his customers, who don’t have another store deep in the valley.
He said he plans to keep the store open because he likes helping his customers, but now feels nervous whenever strangers enter the store. He said he will limit the number of people who can enter at the same time.
While it was the first robbery at the store, which has been open about 21⁄2 years, it wasn’t the first hardship for Cho, who jokes that he has the mind of a 29-year-old.
About five years ago his commercial fishing boat, Manaloa, was destroyed in a cooking fire that killed one crew member at Honolulu Harbor.
Without his fishing business, he opened a store in the neighborhood at his wife’s suggestion.
Cho said he was happy police arrested his alleged attackers.
According to a police affidavit, an officer who is familiar with Keliipuleole-Gasmen identified him in the security video. Officers located him Wednesday on North King Street in Kalihi.
While he was being booked, police allegedly found a bag in his pocket containing a substance resembling crystal meth.
The affidavit said the attackers took several hundred dollars from the store.
Jay Kaleimamahu of Palolo said the Chos are a friendly couple who give back to the community, and she recalled they held a barbecue for customers and even gave her a ride to work in town.
"They’re good people," she said. "It was very sad."
Her boyfriend, Fatu Leuta, said the Chos allow customers to purchase on credit and said their store is convenient for residents in the back of the valley.
"This valley is peaceful," he said. "For these guys to come in and do something to people who are trying to make a decent living, it’s nuts."
