Toshio Meronek
How Hula Dancing Came to Arizona Prisons
Toshio Meronek - April 8, 2013
Islands in the Sand
Why thousands of Hawaiian prisoners are languishing in the Arizona desert
![Delbert Wakinekona. Photo by Marco Garcia](https://hyphenmagazine.com/sites/default/files/styles/magazine_issue_columns/public/magazine/issue-26-south-spring-2013/islands-sand/26feathawaiiprisondelbertmarcogarcia3web.jpg?itok=8dYDC4S7)
Written by Toshio Meronek
In the mid-1970s, Delbert Wakinekona became a local celebrity in Hawaii. Convicted of murder, he escaped not once, but twice from Halawa State Prison on Oahu. “They catch me about six months later, they take me back to prison and hook up high security: closed-circuit TV, electric doors,” he says.
After the first escape, the governor declared on television: “Wakinekona will never escape again from there.” Months later, he escaped. Again.