Pohnpei, FM - Sometime before 7:00 on the evening of Monday, August 27, Gayvy Ann Hallers left the home where she lived with her parents saying that she was going to have sakau with friends. Somehow she ended up on the causeway riding in the bed of a pickup truck at around 4:00 in the morning the next day, in the company of three young men one of whom she called her boyfriend.
At nearly 4:30 in the morning the next day, one of the young men woke the sister of Gayvy's mother with the disturbing news that Gayvy had been involved in an accident and that he didn't think that she would survive. The young man gave the sister no further information other than that Gayvy had been taken to the hospital.
The information that the unidentified young man gave was correct at least on one point. Nineteen year old Gayvy's life ended on Tuesday morning, August 28. How she came to have a mortal head wound is the subject of an ongoing investigation.
Acting Attorney General Salomon Saimon said, "We have strong reasons to believe there was a crime. The case has not been closed." He also said that two of the men who were with Gayvy in her last moments had "left our jurisdiction."
One went to China to continue his schooling and the other went to the United States. The circumstantial evidence gathered so far was not enough to have stopped them from leaving Pohnpei.
Magdalena and Simon Augustine Hallers, Gayvy's parents said that when they arrived at the hospital they expected that Gayvy's boyfriend would be there, worrying, maybe crying; but he wasn't. He wasn't even there. He left shortly after taking Gayvy to the emergency room. The driver of the light green pickup truck the four had been riding in had also already left the hospital.
The Hallers heard from unidentified sources that Gayvy had fallen out of the back of the pickup truck and hit the road on the causeway somewhere around the vicinity of the Senny's warehouse.
Magdalena said that it seemed strange to her that besides a massive head injury her daughter didn't have any scrapes like she thought someone who fell out of a pickup truck would have. She said that her daughter had been wearing a sleeveless top and that
She had only a small scratch on her shoulder underneath the top but no abrasions anywhere else on her body. She said that the material of the top that covered the scratch on Gayvy's shoulder was not abraded.
Police have been hesitant to talk about the case. Police Chief Joe Roby has only said that there were certain inconsistencies in the reports of the three young men and that there may have been witnesses.
He has been hesitant to divulge much more because the Police Department is still trying to find the facts in the case. For several weeks he told The Kaselehlie Press that the Department expected to make an arrest in the following week. They apparently were unable to gather enough information to make any arrests.
According to Saimon, the time of day and the visibility at that time on the nearly pitch black causeway to Dekehtik has made it difficult to find witnesses. Saimon said during a phone conversation that he felt the police department needs help in establishing a case that is more solid than the circumstantial evidence they have been able to gather to date. They need eyewitnesses. Saimon is asking anyone who witnessed anything that occurred on the causeway in the early morning hours of Tuesday, August 28 to contact either the Police Department Detective Section at 320- 3774 or his office at 320-2356.
Gayvy Ann Hallers had just started her second year at the College of Micronesia where she was majoring in Liberal Arts and had developed an interest in Computer Information Systems. Her parents described her as a happy girl who laughed often. They said that Gayvy had many friends. "Chuukese, Yapese, Kosraen, Pingalapese, people from all over the place…It didn't matter. Gayvy had plenty of friends." Magdalena, when asked how they were dealing with it said, "we're just trying to cope one day at a time."
If you have any information on the death of Gayvy Ann Hallers you are urged to call one of the numbers above.