The brief escape last week of Hawai'i State Hospital patient Casey Nies generated a police CrimeStoppers alert and alarmed Windward O'ahu residents, but there was no similar warning or public outcry when Nies absconded in November and was at large in the community for four months.

Nies, who was deemed "actively psychotic" after his arrest in 2003 for allegedly trying to murder a Maui police officer, was on a court-approved "conditional release" from the hospital last year to attend a drug treatment program elsewhere on O'ahu, but walked away from that program in late November, court records show.

Maui Circuit Judge Shackley Raffetto issued a bench warrant Nov. 28 for the arrest of Nies, but he wasn't recaptured until late last month after he had made his way to Kaua'i. Nies was living in a vacant building there when law enforcement finally caught up with him, according to court files.

"He was lucid or smart enough to travel to another island," Maui Deputy Prosecutor John Kim said.

A Kaua'i grand jury this month indicted Nies on four criminal counts, including first- and second-degree burglary, theft and criminal property damage.

Prosecutors there could not be reached for comment on the case.

Nies' Maui defense lawyer, Wendy Hudson, said she was surprised both when Nies absconded from the treatment program last year and again when he escaped from the hospital this week.

"He was doing well, he was taking his meds, he was going to treatment," said Hudson, supervising attorney in the Maui Public Defender's office.

"I actually like him," she said of Nies. "He's smart, he has a lot of good ideas, but when he stops taking his meds, he decompensates."

State hospital officials refused comment when asked why the public wasn't notified after Nies disappeared last year.

They also did not comment on how a mental patient only recently returned to the facility after a four-month escape could walk out of the hospital less than a month later.

The state Health Department, which runs the hospital, is required by federal and state law to "keep confidential all information concerning patients committed to its custody for mental health and/or substance abuse treatment," said department spokeswoman Janice Okubo.

"Therefore," Okubo continued, "the DOH is restricted from providing comment on any specific case."

This week, Honolulu police issued a CrimeStoppers alert after Nies was reported missing the morning of April 20 by the hospital.

Nies was caught the following day after a motorist reported seeing him at a bus stop on Kahekili Highway several miles away from the hospital.

HPD spokeswoman Michelle Yu said no record could be found that police here were notified last year that Nies was at large in the community.

Hudson said Maui authorities were immediately notified last year when Nies went missing from the private treatment program but she speculated that Honolulu police were notified this year because he escaped from the hospital itself.

Court records show that Nies has been granted conditional release from the hospital at least three times since 2006 to attend privately operated mental health and drug treatment programs on O'ahu.

From 2006 through much of 2007, he was allowed by the court to enroll in two treatment programs, but was ordered returned to the state hospital in November 2007.

Judge Raffetto renewed the conditional release in January 2008 to attend another treatment program but directed that if Nies went missing for more than half an hour, prosecutors had to be notified. He lifted that restriction in July after receiving reports from medical personnel that Nies was "doing fine," according to minutes of the court hearing.

When Nies disappeared in November, Raffetto ordered the warrant for his arrest.

After Nies was recaptured in March, Raffetto ordered him re-committed to the state hospital.