WWII veteran fights off intruder

Kyt · Jul 30, 2008

Good for him :clapping:

WWII veteran fights off intruder - Breaking News Updates from Portland and Oregon - The Oregonian - OregonLive.com

CEDAR MILL --When a clean-cut young man knocked on Art Iwasaki's front door Monday afternoon, the silver-haired, 88-year-old veteran calmly turned down his request for a donation for a school.

Iwasaki had no reason to think the man would stick a gun in his face and demand money moments later.

After rejecting the donation request, Iwasaki sat back down in his wood-paneled study, next to the front door of his Cedar Mill home. He watched the man walk across the street and up the hill in the 12800 block of Northwest Majestic Sequoia Way.

Iwasaki leaned back and, soothed by an electric massage pad attached to his office chair, dozed off.

About 15 minutes later --just after 2 p.m. Monday, according to police reports --he woke to a masked man standing behind him.

"He half-startled me," Iwasaki recounted. Then, "I turn around and I see a gun in my face."

Iwasaki was sure it was the same man he had turned away because he recognized the jacket the man wore on this warm afternoon.

"I said, 'What are you here for? What do you want?' " Iwasaki said.

The man responded calmly that he needed money.

But Iwasaki wasn't going to make it easy. Pointing at his hearing aids, he pretended not to understand the man's demand and handed him a notepad.

When the would-be robber repeated his request in writing, Iwasaki feigned problems reading the small letters. He handed the man a larger pad and motioned him to write things down again.

"I was stalling for time, because I knew my daughter was upstairs," Iwasaki said.

Stephanie Sakauye, 55, who shares the house with her father, was working in an upstairs office. She had moved back in so he wouldn't be alone after his wife died.

When Iwasaki called his daughter's name, she yelled down that she was on the phone. Then she realized something in his voice wasn't quite right. She went downstairs, continuing her business call on a wireless headset.

"I was totally shocked when I saw a man in a ski mask waving a gun around," Sakauye said. "I was shaking and didn't know what to say."

The would-be robber was shocked, too. "You need to get off the phone," he said.

She didn't. Instead, she demanded the man lower the gun and leave the house. She admitted later that she thought about giving him money, but she was afraid to leave him alone with her father.

With the man's attention on his daughter, Iwasaki grabbed a bamboo cane from a corner and moved toward him. The 6-foot athletic man pushed the 5-foot, slightly hunched senior.

"Don't you touch him!" his daughter screamed.

Meanwhile, the person on the other end of Sakauye's phone call had dialed 9-1-1. But that person didn't know her address.

The man slapped the headset off Sakauye's head. He'd had enough.

Warning the father and daughter to stay away from the door, he put the gun in his backpack and walked out. He didn't get a penny.

Iwasaki didn't heed the warning and stepped outside, watching the man disappear up the road on foot. His daughter called the police, who surrounded the neighborhood within minutes and brought in dogs.

So far, no trace of the intruder has turned up, even though two neighbors also saw him and gave descriptions, said Sgt. David Thompson, a Washington County Sheriff's Office spokesman.

Iwasaki's face broke into a broad grin as he recounted his resistance. "Afterward I thought what a stupid thing that was to do," he said.

"I've had rifles pointed at me, but never a pistol. I should have given him my wallet and told him to go."

Iwasaki, a Hillsboro native and decorated veteran, was honored last weekend as part of the celebration of the 60th anniversary of the desegregation of the U.S. armed forces. He served in a segregated unit that became the most decorated Army infantry group in U.S. history.

Iwasaki fought across France and Italy during World War II and was wounded three times. He earned a Purple Heart with two oak leaf clusters and a Bronze Star before returning to Hillsboro in 1946.

Despite Iwasaki's military experience, Washington County deputies are wary about people confronting gun-wielding suspects.

"Obviously, we don't encourage people to confront armed burglars," Thompson said.

Investigators are still pursuing the would-be robber.

He was about 20 years old, 6 feet tall and 160 pounds with reddish-brown hair. He wore a black ski mask and gloves, a dark black or brown jacket, shorts, tennis shoes and a gray or black backpack.
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spidge · Jul 31, 2008

Another gutless, spineless dropout who dwells on the elderly. He will do it again and hopefully get "court".

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WWII veteran fights off intruder

Kyt Άρης

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