'I felt human during those four days:' Captured Hawaii psychiatric patient says in jail exclusive

Randall Saito, 59, speaks to KCRA from the San Joaquin County Jail. Nov. 16, 2017

A "dangerous" man who escaped from a psychiatric hospital in Hawaii and took a plane to San Jose before he was captured in Stockton told KCRA 3  in an exclusive jailhouse interview that he did it all to prove that he could live as a normal citizen of society.

"They won't give me a chance. They're not going to release me," Randall Saito, 59,  told KCRA on Thursday from the San Joaquin County Jail. "And once I kind of understood that, I kind of figured, well, if anything's going to happen, it's going to happen with me. I'm going to have to do something pretty risky and gutsy to prove to these guys that I can handle myself in the community."

Saito devised a plan to get out of the Hawaii State Hospital, located just outside of Honolulu.

"I decided to run away and come to the mainland and to live as long as I can on the money that I had, in the community without getting into any kind of trouble," Saito said. "I felt human during those four days. I want people in Stockton to know that I was not going to hurt anybody."
 

Saito made it off the island with $7,000, but he wouldn't disclose where he got the money from or who helped him escape the mental hospital.

Honolulu police received a tip that Saito was on his way to his brother's home in Stockton, and that tip was forwarded to law enforcement officials in Stockton. He was arrested Wednesday morning at a gas station near Highway 99 and Waterloo Road in Stockton after a taxi cab driver recognized him as one of her passengers and called the San Joaquin County Sheriff's Department.

Saito was acquitted of the 1979 murder of Sandra Yamashiro by reason of insanity and was committed to the Hawaii State Hospital in 1981. Yamashiro was found shot and repeatedly stabbed in her car at a mall.

When asked why he killed Yamashiro, Saito said told KCRA he was on drugs, adding that he's not going to ask her family for forgiveness because he knows there's no forgiveness for what he did.

"Three years of substance abuse -- I actually snapped that night. I lost it killing the woman, stabbing her to death," Saito said. "I regret it every day. I pray for her every day. I believe the family I offended has the right to take my life but no one else. I owe them something I cannot repay."