Honolulu police tore through two warehouses sitting on the same Iwaena Street property in Halawa on Tuesday evening, walking away with 39 illegal gaming machines, drug paraphernalia, illegal drugs and more than $22,900 in cash. The search warrants were executed around 5 p.m., marking one of the larger single-property hauls in the department’s ongoing campaign against Oahu’s underground game room industry.
According to Honolulu Police, the operation was carried out by HPD’s Narcotics/Vice Division Gambling Detail with help from the District 3 Crime Reduction Unit, the Forfeiture Detail, the Airport Operations Group, the Specialized Services Division and Emergency Medical Services. Police said all recovered items were submitted into evidence, and that the two warehouses targeted sat on the same property in Halawa.
The Halawa raid landed just days after HPD’s Gambling Detail hit an illegal game room on Old Fort Weaver Road in Ewa Beach on August 6, seizing 15 gaming machines and over $2,700 in cash, as detailed by the Honolulu Police Department. Together, the back-to-back busts show a Vice Division that has kept up a steady tempo of raids across the island through the first half of August.
A Strategy Built Around Property Owners, Not Just Players
HPD leadership has been clear that these tactical sweeps are only part of a longer game. Maj. Jerome Pacarro said short-term enforcement operations have been effective in disrupting illegal game rooms, but that they represent just one piece of HPD’s broader strategy — one increasingly focused on identifying and holding accountable the people who facilitate, organize and profit from illegal gambling, rather than just confiscating machines…