Out of the blue, my phone rings about 2:00pm on Tuesday, February 9th and for the first time in over 6 years I am speaking to the prime suspect in Kristen's disappearance.
I should define 'prime suspect' here at the start. For the past six years, Oakland Police Department has focused solely on Jon Onuma as being somehow involved with Kristen's disappearance.
Officer Patrick Mahanay has been the lead investigator on this case since day one. I need to emphasize to the readers of this website that I am not in the loop from the police departments point of view. In no way do I want to give the impression that they take me into their confidence and tell me what is going on in the investigation. I do know, however, that they read this website because they have told me that much.
Onuma is the one who made the phone call to the ABC studio annonymously saying two lesbians killed Kristen and that one of the gals worked at the local YMCA. Mahanay interviewed these women and it was obvious from the start that they had nothing to do with this. The women told the police that a guy named 'Jon Onuma' made the phone call - and that is how he surfaced in this case.
Jon told me on the phone that making that phone call was just a dumb mistake and that he will be paying for it the rest of his life. He repeatedly told me that he was aware that he brought this all on himself and that he has no one to blame but himself.
"I want to clear this up so it will go away, Dennis", he said. "I have nothing to do with Kristen. I put the blame on those women because they were hassling my girlfriend, (Jill Lampo) at work and I just wanted revenge so I made that stupid call."
Jon went on to say that he has begged the OPD to take a polygraph but that they refused to do so. He told me that he would "go anywhere, do anything" to help clear his name. He kept telling me that would readily agree to take a 'chemical polygraph' but that no one will take him up on it.
Beyond that - Jon said he would spend as much time on the phone with me and answer any and all questions I had. To his credit - he lived up to his word on that score as we spent about 90 minutes on the phone. He never got angry at any question I had for him and told me I could call him anytime.
Ok - that is the good side of Jon Onuma. Here is the other side. He recently got a woman pregnant and has skipped out on any parental responsility. The child will be born in a couple months and he claims he has no idea where the woman is. "She lives in a van with her mother. I haven't seen her in about 7 months."
The company he was working for, Personal Prosperity, owned by Daniel Dubie, is being sued by a female employee because Onuma was sexually harrasing her. (He claims he no longer works there.)
A woman in NJ claims Onuma raped her as did another gal in San Francisco. A gal south of San Fran went on national TV claiming Onuma was violent and burned her repeatedly with cigarettes.
That is just some of what I know.
Then there iare the credit card scams stealing almost 20,000 worth of camera equipment from B+H Photo in NYC and having them delivered to the A-OK Mail Drop located at 350 Ward Avenue in Honolulu, Hi.
There is more but I am not posting it at this time because it does not serve Kristen's interests to let Onuma know what else we know.
This is just what I know. It is my guess that the Oakland Police have alot more on this guy.
Ok - so Onuma is no choir boy. Even he will admit to that. With that said - is he capable of actually harming Kristen (if he in fact has met her?) Well - that we just do not know. If he is just a low-life scoundrel that has nothing to do with Kristen - then we need to know that as well so we can all be quickly be rid of him and everyone focus our efforts elsewhere.
To that end, Onuma is saying he is so worn out by all of this that he is willing to help up find the truth. I have asked Onuma to provide proof of his travels outside the country since 1997. This is important because of the tip we received that Kristen was seen alive in Granada, Nicaragua in May 2000.
Onuma claims he has been to Germany and Thailand but never to Central America and he said that he will get a printout of his passport activity and send it to me.
In other areas I felt he was clearly BSing me. I asked him for his email address and he said he had none which I do not believe. He cruises S&M chat rooms to meet girls yet he claims he doesn't have an email address. (To his credit -Onuma hasn't been online in over three years since he last owned a computer.)
Also - he claims he doesn't know Daniel Dubie's phone number. Remember - he worked for Dubie and even lived in Dubie's home for awhile. Once we learned this and began spreading the word - Dubie quickly evicted him. (Dubie is a very wealthy businessman and owns several properties in Hawaii.) Somehow, Onuma convinced him to allow him use of one of his million dollar homes to live in alone!" For some reason, Onuma claims that he didn't know Dubie's phone number saying "everytime we spoke on the phone, Dennis, Daniel called me." (Jon contests this version - he said he never had to convince Dubie of anything - that Dubie freely offered him use of the home since that is where all the video editing was being done.)
Not too convincing.
There is more - but I feel that it is best for Kristen that I not post stuff here and just let Oakland Police handle it. I am convinced that OPD has 500 times more info on Onuma than I have so it is important to let them do their job.
In the coming weeks, I will focus on giving Onuma the room he needs to clear his own name. To start with - lets see if he follows through with his promise to provide passport records. (Jon - I know you will be reading this. Please give us some credit and recognize the fact that anything you so or any document you provide is going to be independently verified.)
Ok - stay tuned everyone. I will keep you posted.
