Bloomington police announce arrest in Jan. 9 encampment murder
In a Friday mid-afternoon news release (Jan. 19), Bloomington police have announced the arrest of a suspect in the shooting death of a 52-year-old man 10 days earlier, in an encampment on the city’s west side, near Wheeler Mission.
According to the news release, a 41-year-old woman, Evelynn L. Kuuleilehaunani, has been arrested and charged with murder.
The narrative in the news release includes an account of witnesses seeing Kuuleilehaunani raise a revolver above her head and firing one round up into the air, then lowering the gun and firing several shots into the victim’s tent. According to the news release, witnesses said Kuuleilehaunani then gathered her belongings and fled.
The victim had reportedly been in a relationship with the victim, according to the news release.
According to the news release, police investigators filed several affidavits with the Monroe County circuit courts as part of their effort to find Kuuleilehaunani. Early on Friday (Jan. 19), police concluded that their suspect was inside a residence in the 500 block of South Basswood Drive which is also on the city’s west side, just east of I-69.
According to the news release, around 1 o’clock Friday morning, police saw Kuuleilehaunani leave the residence and start walking south. She was taken into custody without incident, according to the news release.
The BPD news release refers to Kuuleilehaunani as “transient.” The BPD defines “transient” in its general police order on encampments as someone “who lacks stable housing or employment and stays in one place for brief periods of time” and “someone who moves from place to place, just passing through the area, and is not staying for a long time.”
That’s contrasted with the general police order’s definition of a “person experiencing homelessness,” which is “an individual who lacks a fixed, regular, and adequate nighttime residence, a stable residence, or any residence at all,…”
